<*•* 


PERCY    BYSSHE    SHELLEY. 


From   The  Californian  Illustrated  Magazine. 


Ibeatb's  Englisb  Classics 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND 


A  Lyrical  Drama 


PERCY   BYSSHE   SHELLEY 


EDITED    BY 

VIDA   D.  SCUDDER,  M.A. 


BOSTON,  U.S.A. 

. 

PUBLISHED   BY  D.  C.   HEATH  &  CO. 
1906 


COPYRIGHT,  1892, 
BY  VIDA  D.  SCUDDER. 


PREFACE. 


No  student's  edition  exists  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound, 
the  greatest  work  of  Shelley.  Because  of  its  length,  abstruse- 
ness,  and  difficulty,  the  drama  has  been  little  used  in  the 
classroom :  and,  indeed,  while  its  aesthetic  glory  has  been 
fully  recognized,  its  spiritual  and  historical  significance  has 
till  lately  been  often  ignored,  even  by  lovers  of  Shelley.  Yet 
the  Prometheus  Unbound  gives  perhaps  the  most  perfect 
expression  anywhere  to  be  found  of  the  thought  and  passion 
of  a  great  period  of  English  poetry.  It  fully  initiates  the 
earnest  student  into  the  ideals  of  the  Revolution  —  those 
ideals  which,  in  their  development,  are  determining  the  trend 
of  our  modern  life.  There  is  no  need  to  speak  of  the  imagi- 
native fervor  and  pure  lyricism  of  the  drama  :  few  English 
poems  can  be  more  effective  to  quicken  and  train  aesthetic 
sensitiveness.  So  far  as  difficulty  is  concerned,  the  student 
who  can  understand  the  Faery  Queene  can  understand  the 
Prometheus  Unbound. 

It  is  hoped  that  the  present  edition  may  make  the  poem 
more  widely  known  to  the  general  reader,  and  more  available 
for  purposes  of  the  classroom.  The  aim  has  been  to  supply 

iii 


2056176 


iv  PREFACE. 

a  good  critical  apparatus  for  the  study  of  the  drama  as  a 
work  of  art  and  as  an  historic  product.  To  this  end,  the 
Introduction  discusses  the  different  aspects  of  the  drama, 
and  the  Notes  deal  largely  with  suggestions  for  comparative 
study  and  with  extracts  from  the  best  criticisms  on  the  poem. 
Mythological  and  historic  allusions  to  be  found  in  ordinary 
reference-books  are  not  explained. 

The  text  followed  is  that  of  Forman's  edition,  except  in 
two  or  three  instances  where  a  different  reading  has  been 
adopted.  Such  instances  are  always  mentioned  in  the  Notes. 

Much  help  has  of  course  been  derived  from  the  critics 
and  interpreters  of  Shelley,  especially  from  Todhunter,  Ros- 
setti,  James  Thomson,  Dowden,  and  Symonds.  For  the 
"Suggestions  towards  a  Comparison  of  the  Prometheus 
Unbound  of  Shelley  with  the  Prometheus  Bound  of  ^Eschy- 
lus,"  I  am  indebted  to  the  work  of  my  friend,  Miss  Lucy  H. 
Smith,  A.B. 

VIDA   D.  SCUDDER. 

WELLESLEY  COLLEGE, 
August,  1892. 


CONTENTS. 


PREFACE iii 

INTRODUCTION  : 

I.    THE  DRAMA  AND  THE  TIME ix 

II.     A  STUDY  OF  THE  MYTH xxvii 

III.    THE  DRAMA  AS  A  WORK  OF  ART    ....     xlii 

SHELLEY'S  PREFACE 3 

PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND 9 

SUGGESTIONS  TOWARDS  A  COMPARISON   OF  PROMETHEUS  UN- 
BOUND WITH  THE  PROMETHEUS  BOUND  OF  AESCHYLUS      .     121 

NOTES 145 

EXTRACTS  FROM  CRITICISMS  ON  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND  .        .167 
BIBLIOGRAPHY  OF  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND        .        .        .        .171 


INTRODUCTION. 


INTRODUCTION. 

>;<*:< 

I. 

THE   DRAMA   AND   THE   TIME. 

SHELLEY'S  lyrical  drama,  the  Prometheus  Unbound,  is 
unique  in  the  great  cycle  of  English  song.  From  the  larger 
part  of  that  song  it  is  distinguished  at  once  by  an  audacious 
idealism.  Generalizations  are  dangerous  ;  yet  we  may  surely 
say  that  the  dominant  trend  of  our  sturdy  English  literature 
has  been  towards  realism.  In  the  Middle  Ages,  English 
Chaucer  sings  with  frank  and  buoyant  vigor  o/  the  fair 
green  earth  beneath  him  and  the  men  and  women  at  his 
side,  while  Italian  Dante  penetrates  with  fervid  passion  the 
spiritual  spheres  open  to  mediaeval  vision,  and  brings  back 
strange  messages  from  the  souls  of  the  lost  and  of  the 
blessed.  The  Elizabethan  imagination  claps  a  girdle  round 
the  earth,  but  rarely  soars  into  the  heavens.  It  is  the  Ger- 
man genius,  not  the  English,  which  expresses  the  struggle  of 
the  human  soul  in  a  shadowy  protagonist,  embodiment  of  the 
symbolism  of  the  ages,  and  replaces  a  Hamlet  known  to  his- 
tory by  a  legendary  Faust.  The  idealism  of  Milton  seems, 
beside  that  of  Dante,  intellectual  and  forced.  The  litera- 
ture of  the  eighteenth  century  is  the  transcript  of  the  life  e£ 
society  ;  Victorian  literature  is  the  transcript  of  the  life  of  the 

ix 


X  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND. 

soul.  Everywhere  our  English  genius  tends  to  express  itself 
through  forms  of  experience  and  of  fact. 

The  early  poetry  of  the  nineteenth  century  is  a  notable 
exception  to  this  principle.  The  work  of  Wordsworth  and 
Coleridge,  of  Keats  and  Shelley,  is  in  tone  frankly  ideal. 
The  idealism  which  pervades  all  the  writings  of  these  poets, 
from  the  Ancient  Mariner  to  Hyperion,  finds  its  fullest 
and  most  glorious  manifestation  in  the  Prometheus  Un- 
bound, which  is  the  supreme  achievement  of  Shelley.  De- 
spite the  wondrous  nature-poetry  of  the  drama,  the  whole 
action  takes  place,  not  on  this  solid  earth  of  hill  and  forest, 
but  in  an  unknown  region  which  has  no  existence  outside 
the  soul  of  man.  The  personages  are  vast  abstractions,  dim 
though  luminous ;  like  wraiths  of  mist  in  morning  sunlight 
they  drift  around  us,  appearing,  vanishing,  in  mystic  sequence. 
Over  the  whole  drama  plays,  though  with  broken  and  waver- 
ing lustre,  the  "  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land,"  and 
not  once  /ioes  the  "poet's  dream"  change  to  the  sober 
world  of  waking  fact. 

Yet  to  speak  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound  as  the  highest 
expression  of  modern  English  idealism  is  hardly  to  justify 
our  claim  that  the  drama  is  unique.  We  find  much  con- 
temporary poetry  of  the  same  order,  although  less  great ; 
and  our  English  genius  is,  moreover,  too  plastic  to  lack 
entirely,  at  any  period,  the  ideal  element.  It  is  in  a  work 
of  the  sixteenth  century  that  we  find  the  closest  parallel  to 
the  Prometheus  Unbound.  Edmund  Spenser,  during  the 
full  dominance  of  Elizabethan  realism,  is  as  pure  an  idealist 
as  Shelley,  and  the  Faery  Queene  and  the  modern  drama 
are  in  many  ways  strangely  akin.  At  a  glance,  this  kinship 
is  obvious.  The  two  poems  belong  alike  to  that  highest 


INTRODUCTION.  XI 

order  of  imaginative  work  which  includes  the  Book  of  Job, 
Faust,  Paracelsus,  and  claims  as  its  greatest  example  the 
Divine  Comedy  of  Dante.  Both  poems  deal  with  spiritual 
forces,  with  the  eternal  conflict  of  good  and  evil ;  the  action 
to  be  wrought  out  is  in  both  the  final  redemption  of  the 
soul  of  man.  The  Faery  Queene,  like  the  Prometheus, 
transports  us  to  an  unreal  world,  where  forms  of  visionary 
beauty  speak  to  us,  not  of  concrete  human  life,  but  of  ethical 
and  spiritual  truth.  Both  poems,  in  a  word,  are  symbolic. 

Yet  the  more  thoughtfully  we  read,  the  sooner  will  a  radi- 
cal difference  between  the  spirit  of  the  two  poems  become 
manifest, — a  difference  so  great  that  it  will  force  us  to  put  the 
poem  of  Shelley  quite  by  itself.  For  the  Faery  Queene  is 
an  allegory ;  the  Prometheus  Unbound  not  only  deals  with 
mythological  conceptions,  it  is  a  genuine  myth. 

In  the  Faery  Queene,  the  relation  of  the  forms  to  the 
ideas  is  the  result  of  the  conscious  and  deliberate  invention 
of  Spenser.  Una,  says  the  poet  to  himself,  shall  stand  for 
Truth,  Guyon  for  Temperance,  Archimago  for  Hypocrisy. 
The  characters,  thus  laden  with  double  meaning,  are  made 
to  pass  through  various  significant  adventures.  Sometimes 
the  allegory  grows  tedious  to  Spenser,  and  he  drops  it  from 
consciousness,  seeing  for  the  time  in  his  creations  only 
ladies  faire  and  lovely  knights,  instead  of  the  Christian 
virtues ;  more  often  still  it  grows  tedious  to  the  reader,  who 
gladly  forgets  all  didactic  suggestion,  to  wander  dreamily 
through  an  enchanted  land.  The  connection  between  story 
and  meaning,  not  only  here  but  in  all  allegories,  is  arbitrary 
rather  than  essential. 

No  one  can  read  the  Prometheus  Unbound  without  fedf-' 
ing  a  different  method  of  conception  at  work.    Asia,  lone, 


xii  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND. 

Panthea,  Prometheus  himself,  all  the  actors  in  the  drama, 
are  indeed  impersonations  of  abstract  qualities,  and  the 
whole  action  is  spiritual  in  undercurrent,  though  on  the 
surface  natural.  But  the  connection  between  natural  and 
spiritual  is  no  longer  arbitrary.  There  has  been  no  painful 
invention,  unless  in  some  minor  details ;  these  figures  have 
flashed  upon  the  inner  vision  of  the  poet  in  perfect  unity  of 
soul  and  form.  Where  an  allegory  is  reasoned  and  labored, 
a  myth  is  instinctive  and  spontaneous.  The  systematic  for- 
mality of  the  allegory  is  replaced  in  the  myth  by  something 
of  the  large,  divinely  simple  significance  of  the  very  symbol- 
ism of  nature.  An  allegory  is  the  result  of  experience ;  a 
myth,  of  intuition. 

Now,  to  speak  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound  as  a  myth 
seems  at  first  sight  to  involve  a  contradiction.  It  is  incon- 
sistent with  our  idea  of  poetic  development ;  for  the  evolu- 
tion of  the  myth  is  almost  entirely  confined  to  the  childhood 
of  races.  This  is  inevitable,  since  the  myth  is  an  uncon- 
scious form  of  art,  and  unconsciousness  belongs  to  child- 
hood. The  wide-eyed  and  reverent  wonder  of  the  child  sees 
in  this  new  world  of  life  and  mystery  around  him  spiritual 
creations  pressing  everywhere  through  the  material  veil. 
His  instinctive  faith  cannot  survive  the  familiarity  with 
earthly  facts,  the  scientific  temper,  of  maturity.  Analysis 
has  replaced  intuition ;  wonder  is  lost  in  curiosity.  — 

"  There  was  an  awful  rainbow  full  in  Heaven : 
We  know  its  name  and  nature;  it  is  given 
In  the  dull  catalogue  of  common  things," 

mourns  Keats.  Thus  it  is  in  the  infancy  of  the  Aryan  race, 
in  the  early  days  of  Hellas,  in  the  vigorous  youth  of  the 


INTRODUCTION.  xiii 

Norsemen,  that  we  find  the  great  myth  cycles  treasured  by 
our  scholars  to-day,  —  poem-stories,  with  the  dawn-light 
fresh  upon  them.  Through  our  own  oldest  epic,  Beowulf, 
even  yet  flash  traces  of  the  myth ;  but  they  soon  fade  out, 
never  to  reappear,  replaced  by  the  frank  and  sunny  natural- 
ism of  Chaucer,  Shakespeare,  and  Browning. 

Never  to  reappear?  Not  so.  In  the  early  days  of  our 
own  century,  when  the  English  race  had  passed  through 
many  a  stern  experience,  when  it  had  gathered  much  of  the 
bitter  wisdom  of  maturity  into  its  thought  and  speech,  once 
more  it  was  to  dream  dreams  and  see  visions,  and  the  fairest 
of  these  dreams  was  to  be  given  to  the  world  through 
the  poet-soul  of  Shelley,  a  genuine  and  beautiful  myth,  in 
the  form  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound.  Prometheus,  Asia, 
lone,  —  their  likeness  is  to  be  sought,  not  in  a  Macbeth,  a 
Desdemona,  or  a  Pompilia,  but  in  Thetis  the  silver-footed, 
in  Perseus,  slayer  of  the  Gorgon,  in  Athene,  child  of  Zeus. 
The  mystic  action  of  the  drama  recalls,  not  the  human  stir 
and  passion  of  our  modern  tragedy,  but  the  solemn  move- 
ment of  the  stories  of  the  elder  world.  The  Prometheus 
Unbound  is  no  mere  retelling  of  an  ancient  tale,  like  the 
Greek  poems  of  William  Morris ;  it  is  in  all  essentials  an 
original  conception.  The  drama  starts,  indeed,  from  the 
./Eschylean  story,  but  the  development  of  the  action,  the 
personages,  the  mode  of  treatment,  are  absolutely  the  poet's 
own.  Like  the  tales  of  gods  and  heroes  in  the  Homeric 
cycle,  even  more  like  the  treatment  of  these  stories  with  a 
fuller  spiritual  consciousness  in  the  work  of  the  Greek  trage- 
dians, are  the  great  imaginings  of  Shelley. 

The  age  of  Pope  and  the  age  of  Tennyson  are  both  times 
of  peculiar  self-consciousness  and  elaboration.  Between 


xiv  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND. 

these  two  ages  reappears,  for  one  brief  moment,  the  myth. 
In  the  whole  history  of  English  song  there  is  no  stranger 
paradox  than  this.  It  challenges  our  attention  at  once.  If 
we  wish  to  understand  it,  we  first  turn  instinctively  to  the 
great  poetry  which  comes  within  the  same  period  as  the 
Prometheus. 

The  drama  was  written  in  1819;  thus  it  belongs  to  the 
greatest  cycle  of  English  song  since  the  Elizabethan  age. 
Within  the  years  1590-1630  falls  the  chief  work  of  Spen- 
ser, of  the  Elizabethan  lyrists,  of  Marlowe,  Shakespeare,  and 
Ben  Jonson.  Within  the  years  1790-1830  falls  the  finest 
work  of  Blake  and  Burns,  of  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge,  of 
Byron,  Keats,  and  Shelley.  We  know  now  that  those  years 
at  the  beginning  of  our  century  were  great  indeed  ;  we  know 
that  the  poems  sung  in  them  hold  their  own  even  by  the 
side  of  the  wonderful  poetry  of  three  centuries  before.  If 
we  look  at  the  poetic  work  of  the  first  third  of  our  century 
as  a  whole,  we  shall  be  struck  by  its  great  variety ;  yet  we 
shall  also  be  struck,  in  the  midst  of  all  the  variety,  by  a  cer- 
tain all-pervasive  unity  of  tone.  It  is  the  tone  of  youth,  of 
freshness,  of  exuberance  of  life. 

The  poetry  of  the  eighteenth  century  was  tired.  It  had 
repeated  the  wisdom  of  a  worldly  old  age.  It  laid  stress  on 
etiquette,  on  custom,  on  detail ;  it  submitted  to  cautious 
rules ;  and,  when  not  artificially  lively,  it  displayed  a  sober 
and  disillusioned  strength..  Close  now  Pope  or  Thomson, 
and  open  Blake,  Burns,  Wordsworth.  Strange  discovery  ! 
Through  this  poetry,  later  though  it  be,  the  music  of  an 
eternal  youth  goes  ringing.  The  tone  of  wonder,  of  eager- 
ness, of  fulness  of  life,  either  for  joy  or  pain,  is  the  great 
quality  which  distinguishes  the  outburst  of  song  at  the  first 


INTRODUCTION.  XV 

of  our  century  from  the  exhausted  verse  of  the  preceding 
age.  It  is  impossible  to  tell  all  the  different  manifestations 
of  this  new  youthfulness.  The  very  cadence,  the  outward 
form  of  verse,  have  cast  aside  the  grave  restrictions  imposed 
by  a  self-conscious  period,  and  move  with  the  buoyant  and 
varied  grace  of  adolescence ;  the  literal  child  appears  for 
the  first  time  in  Burns  and  Blake  and  Wordsworth ;  the  rest- 
less and  passionate  speculation  of  youth  glances  through  the 
poems  of  Byron,  Coleridge,  and  Shelley.  Finally,  the  myth- 
opceic  faculty  is  by  no  means  confined  to  the  Prometheus 
Unbound,  though  it  finds  fullest  expression  there.  There 
is  no  evidence  of  this  faculty  in  the  poetry  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  or  of  the  Victorian  age  ;  but  poetry  from  Blake  to 
Keats  is  veined  with  it.  In  Blake,  indeed,  it  is  dominant, 
but  fails  to  reach  its  full  effect,  because  his  imaginings, 
though  mighty,  are  broken  and  obscure.  We  find  clear 
traces  of  the  myth  in  the  poems  of  Coleridge,  notably  the 
Ancient  Mariner.  Keats  is  not  sensitive  to  the  spiritual 
possibilities  of  the  myth,  but,  so  far  as  aesthetic  instinct  will 
carry  him,  he  has  the  true  myth-creating  power;  gods, 
nymphs,  and  Titans  breathe  in  living  beauty  in  the  pages 
of  Endymion  and  Hyperion.  To  Shelley,  as  to  the  an- 
cient Greeks,  the  myth  is  the  expression  of  worship,  and  the 
mythopceic  faculty  appears,  disciplined,  free,  and  triumphant, 
in  the  Prometheus  Unbound. 

How  shall  we  explain  the  bright  youthfulness  of  all  this 
poetry?  We  must  explain  it  by  studying  the  historic  period 
from  which  it  sprang.  For  poetry  strikes  its  roots  deep  into 
the  soil  of  national  life,  and  it  is  from  the  passions  and  ideals 
of  history  that  we  must  find  the  inspiration  of  our  poets. 
English  verse  at  the  beginning  of  the  century  is  great  be- 


xvi  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND. 

cause  it  is  the  expression  and  outcome  of  a  great  period. 
No  sooner  do  we  study  the  period  than  the  distinctive  qual- 
ities of  the  poetry  are  explained.  Its  renewed  joy  and  free- 
dom are  but  the  expression  of  the  new  life  that  was  pulsing 
through  the  veins  of  the  old  earth.  For  this  is  the  great 
period  of  the  birth  of  the  modern  world. 

We  may  best  understand  the  Prometheus  Unbound  if 
we  recognize  it  as  the  supreme  expression  in  imaginative 
form  of  the  new  spirit  of  democracy.  The  ideas  which  in- 
spire it  first  found  dynamic  power  in  the  Revolution  of  1 789. 
Thus  the  significance  of  our  paradox  is  revealed.  For  myths 
belong  to  the  dawn ;  and  the  beginning  of  our  century  wit- 
nessed the  dawn  of  a  new  cosmic  day.  We  may  say  in  sober 
reverence  that  not  since  the  coming  of  Christ  had  so  vital  a 
renovating  power  entered  human  life  as  entered  it  one  hun- 
dred years  ago.  It  is  natural  and  beautiful  that  this  new 
beginning  should  be  heralded  by  the  return  of  the  spirit  of 
childhood,  and  that  the  wondering  faith  of  the  time  should 
once  more  as  in  the  days  of  old  find  expression  through  con- 
crete symbol.  At  one  moment  and  one  only  in  the  evolution 
of  English  song  since  the  time  of  Beowulf,  was  possible 
the  formation  of  a  myth ;  and  at  this  moment  appeared  the 
man  to  create  it.  Only  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  only  by  the  man  Shelley,  could  the  Prometheus 
Unbound  have  been  written. 

This  view  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound  will,  it  is  true, 
be  challenged  by  a  whole  school  of  critics.  The  drama  is 
woven  of  dreams,  they  will  tell  us  ;  it  is  a  maze  of  color  and 
music,  devoid  of  definite  structure.  Shall  we  turn  the  most 
ethereal  of  poets  into  a  doctrinaire?  What  relation  has 
poetry  like  this,  of  imagination  all  compact,  to  theories  of 


INTR  OD  UCTION.  xvii 

life  ?  Above  all,  what  relation  can  it  bear  to  that  democracy 
which  is  all  around  us,  practical,  blatant,  vulgar?  The 
eternal  value  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound — thus  perhaps 
say  most  of  the  readers  of  the  drama  —  lies  in  its  poignant 
melody,  its  exquisite  imagery,  in  the  wondrous  beauty  of 
fragments  scattered  here  and  there  through  the  poem.  These 
are  immortal.  But  the  intellectual  conceptions  of  Shelley 
were  simply  the  accidents  of  his  youth,  to  be  forgotten  if 
we  would  read  his  poetry  aright;  and  for  the  underlying 
thought  of  the  drama,  for  its  unity  of  structure,  for  the  mean- 
ing of  Prometheus  and  Demogorgon  and  Panthea  and  the 
other  shadowy  mouth-pieces  of  matchless  verse,  not  one  whit 
will  the  enlightened  critic  care. 

Thus  to  speak  is  to  deny  all  scientific  conceptions  of  litera- 
ture ;  for  it  is  to  deny  the  connection  of  the  poet  with  his 
age.  Much,  indeed,  is  crude  and  weak  in  the  verse  of 
Shelley ;  much  is  held  in  his  immature  intellect,  and  is  never 
fused  by  his  imaginative  passion  into  art ;  but  the  very  warp 
and  woof  of  his  noblest  poetry  is  in  subtle  and  secret  ways 
determined  by  that  faith  which  aesthetic  cynics  would  teach 
us  to  ignore.  Shelley  would  never  have  been  the  greatest 
lyric  poet  of  England,  would  never  have  written  the  Ode  to 
the  West  Wind  nor  the  choruses  to  Hellas,  had  he  been  an 
aristocrat  and  a  conservative.  The  passion  for  freedom  and 
the  aspiration  towards  a  universal  love  sway  his  thought  as 
they  sway  his  form. 

In  order,  then,  to  understand  the  Prometheus  Unbound, 
we  must  look  more  fully  at  the  place  held  by  England^  and 
by  Shelley  in  the  evolution  of  the  democratic  idea.  It  was 
by  France  that  the  idea  was  first  given  to  the  world  in  deeds,. 
—  deeds  stormy,  passionate,  marked  by  the  horror  of  blood- 


xviii  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND. 

shed.  France,  most  impetuous  of  nations,  France,  mad- 
dened by  centuries  of  oppression,  received  the  trust  of  work- 
ing out  the  historic  revolution.  But  this  was  only  half  of  the 
work  to  be  accomplished.  To  express  the  democratic  idea 
in  brief,  historic  act  was  the  work  of  France ;  to  express  it 
in  eternal  art  was  the  work  of  England.  All  poetry,  says 
Wordsworth,  is  the  product  of  emotion  recollected  in  tran- 
quillity. France,  absorbed  in  fierce  and  exhausting  struggle, 
could  not  stop  to  write  poetry ;  yet  the  idea  of  democracy, 
like  all  really  vital  ideas,  had  to  find  expression  in  art  before 
it  could  become  a  precious  possession  forever  to  the  nations. 
Here  came  in  the  work  of  England.  Her  noblest  children, 
touched  to  high  and  tense  emotion  by  the  great  days  in 
which  they  lived,  were  yet  sufficiently  remote  from  the  strug- 
gle to  possess  their  souls  in  that  serenity  which  is  the  neces- 
sary condition  of  all  great  art.  To  the  poets  of  England, 
from  Burns  and  Blake  to  Shelley,  belongs  the  glory  of  having 
first  given  to  the  democratic  idea  an  embodiment  of  undying 
power. 

Very  diverse  is  the  influence  of  the  new  ideal  upon  their 
work.  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge,  the  two  older  poets, 
were  contemporaries  of  the  historic  revolution.  In  the  eager 
days  of  their  youth  they  lived  through  the  swift  revolutionary 
drama,  with  its  changes  from  rapturous  hope  to  terror  and 
despair.  Absorbed  in  the  turmoil  of  the  time,  there  is  small 
wonder  that  they  were  unable  to  distinguish  the  absolute  from 
the  local,  or  that  they  reacted,  in  sober  middle  life,  from  the 
ardor  of  their  democratic  faith.  The  effect  of  democracy  in 
the  work  even  of  Wordsworth  is  indirect,  although  profound, 
and  shows  itself  rather  by  leading  the  imaginative  love  of  the 
poet  to  the  noble  life  of  the  simple  and  the  poor  than  by  in- 


INTRODUCTION.  xix 

flaming  him  with  enthusiasm  for  the  grand  abstract  ideas  of 
the  Revolution.  The  few  poems  of  both  Wordsworth  and 
Coleridge  which  treat  directly  of  the  new  faith  are  occasional 
in  theme.  We  must  seek  a  point  of  view  which  affords  a 
farther  perspective,  if  we  desire  a  vision  of  the  democratic  faith 
in  its  fulness,  freed  from  the  dominance  of  incidental  detail. 

Such  a  point  of  view  was  to  be  found  in  the  second  dec- 
ade of  our  century.  Three  men,  in  this  decade,  hold  the 
supreme  honors  of  English  song :  Byron,  Keats,  and  Shel- 
ley. Of  these,  Keats  represents  the  aesthetic  reaction  from 
the  passion  for  humanity  which  had  possessed  the  soul  of  the 
race  for  over  twenty  years.  Through  his  verse  sweeps  the 
fragrance  of  the  world  of  dreams  ;  redolent  of  beauty,  it  no- 
where breathes  suggestion  of  allegiance  to  a  hard-won  truth, 
nor  of  feeling  for  actual  human  need.  Byron,  on  the  other 
hand,  is  distinctly  a  poet  of  the  Revolution,  but  of  the  Rev- 
olution mainly  on  its  inferior  and  destructive  side.  His 
verse  rings  with  rebellion  and  despair.  The  historic  revolu- 
tion had  failed  :  its  ardent  faith,  its  glowing  hopes,  were 
despised,  during  the  hollow  years  of  the  Empire,  by  all  chil- 
dren of  the  world.  A  child  of  the  world  was  Byron ;  and 
for  him  and  his  fellows  nothing  was  left  at  the  heart  of  life 
but  the  cynical  and  arrogant  individualism  which  forms  the 
negative  and  evil  aspect  of  the  democratic  idea. 

The  children  of  the  world  had  lost  courage ;  but  for  the 
children  of  light  the  glory  of  the  new  ideal  had  never  faded. 
Hardly  affected  by  the  practical  failure  of  the  Revolution, 
freed  from  the  interference  of  historic  outward  detail,  the 
intellectual  and  spiritual  conception  of  the  young  democracy, 
shone  clear  in  the  cloudless  heaven,  for  whosoever  should 
behold. 


XX  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND. 

The  man  to  behold  it  was  Shelley.  His  soul,  pure  as 
crystal,  clear  as  flame,  held  and  fused  the  vital  elements  both 
of  strength  and  weakness  in  the  democratic  ideal.  At  the 
close  of  the  second  decade  of  our  century  he  conceived  the 
Prometheus  Unbound. 

The  drama  is  in  truth  the  perfect  symbolic  reflection  of 
the  conceptions  of  the  new  democracy,  alike  in  their 
strength  and  in  their  weakness.  We  shall  find  it  vague 
where  the  Revolution  was  vague,  crude  where  the  Revolution 
was  crude,  —  that  is,  in  its  intellectual  philosophy ;  we  shall 
find  it  great  where  the  revolution  was  great,  —  that  is,  in  its 
spiritual  ideal. 

We  see  how  completely  the  poem  expresses  the  limita- 
tions as  well  as  the  power  inherent  in  the  new  democratic 
conception  when  we  recall,  briefly,  Shelley's  faith  and  atti- 
tude. Shelley  is  democrat  and  communist.  His  convictions 
are  frankly,  eagerly  anarchical.  The  ruling  passion  of  his 
life  is  the  passion  for  liberty,  and  liberty  to  him,  as  to  most 
thinkers  of  the  time,  means  the  absence  of  law.  He  hates 
authority  with  a  deadly  hatred ;  it  is  by  the  overthrow  of  all 
government,  civil  or  religious,  that  he  expects  the  happiness 
of  humanity  to  be  attained.  This  destructive  political  con- 
ception is  a  simple  reproduction  of  current  ideas,  or  at  least 
of  the  ideas  of  '93.  On  the  ethical  side,  Shelley's  thought 
was  formed  by  two  amusingly  different  influences,  by  Wil- 
liam Godwin,  his  father-in-law,  and  by  Plato.  The  result 
of  this  curious  union  was  paradoxical  enough.  With  all  his 
conscious  intellect,  Shelley  clings  to  the  views  of  Political 
Justice,  a  book  written  by  Godwin  which  expresses  the 
coldest  radicalism  of  revolutionary  thought ;  but  with  every 
higher  instinct,  he  springs  to  greet  the  mystic  idealism  of 


INTRODUCTION.  XXI 

Plato.  The  crudest  and  most  unimaginative  parts  of  the 
Prometheus  Unbound  reflect  the  cheap  doctrinaire  philoso- 
phy of  Godwin,  —  a  philosophy  held  in  Shelley's  mind, 
but  never  in  his  soul.  The  easy  optimism  of  Godwin,  and 
of  all  revolutionary  thinkers,  is  the  phase  of  their  thought 
most  congenial  to  Shelley.  To  the  Revolution  evil  is  a  pure 
accident,  an  external  fact.  It  inheres  in  institutions,  —  how 
it  got  there  we  are  never  told,  —  and  when  these  institutions 
shall  be  shattered,  the  nature  of  man,  pure,  virtuous,  loving, 
will  instantly  restore  the  Age  of  Gold.  This  conception 
determines  the  whole  form  of  the  myth  in  the  Prometheus 
Unbound.  Shallow  though  it  seems  to-day,  it  served  a 
necessary  purpose.  It  roused  men  from  the  lethargy  of 
despair,  and  inspired  them  with  faith  in  man's  control  over 
his  own  destiny.  Like  the  apostolic  expectation  of  the 
immediate  coming  of  the  Lord,  the  pathetic  revolutionary 
optimism  gave  courage  to  an  infant  faith,  and  made  men 
loyal  to  their  ideals  until  the  time  should  come  when  they 
could  stand  alone.  It  enabled  them,  in  Shelley's  words, 

"  To  hope,  till  hope  creates, 
From  its  oVvn  wreck,  the  thing  it  contemplates." 

There  is  another  point  in  which  Shelley's  attitude  is  one 
with  that  of  his  time  :  his  scornful  rejection  of  Christianity. 
No  one  can  read  history  without  seeing  that  it  was  very 
difficult,  in  those  days,  to  be  both  a  democrat  and  a  Chris- 
tian. The  Church  had  identified  itself,  in  the  Revolution, 
with  the  aristocrats.  It  had  chosen  to  side  with  established 
evil  rather  than  with  reform  which  disturbed  peace.  It  had 
its  reward.  No  one  familiar  with  the  respectable  worldliness* 
of  the  recognized  religion  of  England  during  the  first  of  our 


xxii  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND. 

century  can  wonder  that  many  of  the  most  vivid  and  relig- 
ious minds  of  the  day  revolted  from  Christianity.  Shelley, 
with  characteristic  vehemence,  revolted  to  the  very  extreme. 
But  Shelley  does  not  only  reflect  the  intellectual  attitude 
of  the  Revolution :  he  is  also,  and  more  completely,  an  ex- 
ponent of  its  spiritual  passion.  So  far  as  we  have  yet  gone, 
we  might  have  taken  Byron  as  well  as  Shelley  for  our  typical 
poet.  Byron,  too,  had  the  frank  antinomianism,  the  hatred 
of  Christianity,  found  in  the  Revolution,  though  he  lacked  its 
buoyant  optimism.  But  Byron  was  untouched  by  the  higher 
elements  of  democratic  thought,  which  exalt  the  poetry  of 
Shelley.  Through  the  Prometheus  Unbound  breathes  the 
very  spirit  of  the  religion  of  humanity,  the  passionate  sym- 
pathy for  suffering,  the  passionate  love  of  man.  The  power 
to  conceive  vast  abstract  ideals  and  to  render  them  dynamic 
in  human  life  was  a  gift  of  the  Revolution,  in  reaction  from 
the  age  of  common  sense  ;  and  this  gift  created  the  drama. 
Nor  were  there  lacking  in  Shelley's  poetry  or  in  his  life 
elements  of  a  yet  more  spiritual  worship.  Like  the  great  Jew 
Spinoza,  he  might  be  described  as  God-intoxicated.  His 
reason  might  deny,  but  his  imagination  believed ;  and  the 
imagination  was  the  very  centre  of  Shelley's  nature.  We 
may  not  perhaps  follow  Mr.  Browning  in  his  interesting 
suggestion  that  had  Shelley  lived  he  would  have  become  a 
Christian ;  but  we  may,  we  must,  remember  the  extreme 
youth  of  the  poet  when  he  died,  and  if  we  would  be  just, 
seek  for  his  faith,  not  in  the  verse  of  crude  reaction  and 
boyish  polemic,  but  in  the  expression  of  his  moments  of 
highest  insight.  Not  by  Queen  Mab  but  by  Epipsychi- 
dion  and  Adonais  may  we  learn  the  soul  of  Shelley.  His 
soul  cannot  be  labelled  ;  it  is  too  bright  and  swift  and  strange 


INTRODUCTION.  xxiii 

for  that.  But  if  some  name  is  to  suggest  the  order  of  nature 
to  which  Shelley  belonged,  that  of  Pantheist  is  the  best. 
His  thought,  conditioned  here  as  always  by  the  limits  of  his 
time,  lacks  completely  that  reverence  for  the  sacredness  of 
personality  which  is  the  noblest  achievement  of  the  century's 
later  years.  Ignoring  personality  in  man,  it  is  no  wonder 
that  Shelley  ignores  it  in  God  also.  But  the  revolutionary 
movement  was  at  heart  a  spiritual  uprising.  It  marked  the 
rebellion  of  the  human  soul  from  that  mass  of  custom  which, 
in  a  materialized  society,  lay  upon  it 

"  with  a  weight 
Heavy  as  frost,  and  deep  almost  as  life." 

The  new  passion  for  nature  as  the  revelation  of  a  Divine 
Spirit,  the  new  faith  in  love  as  the  law  of  life,  made  a  relig- 
ion far  more  real  than  either  the  deism  or  the  dogmatic 
orthodoxy  of  the  eighteenth  century.  This  was  the  religion 
of  Shelley.  From  all  materialism,  conscious  or  unconscious, 
his  soul  was  severed  by  a  severance  sharp  as  that  between 
death  and  life.  He  sees,  in  nature,  in  the  human  soul,  the 
"  One  Spirit's  plastic  stress  " ;  and  to  attain  perfect  union 
with  the  Soul  of  All  is  his  supreme  desire.  He  worships, 
though  he  worships  he  knows  not  what. 

"  Within  a  cavern  of  man's  trackless  spirit 
Is  framed  an  Image  so  intensely  fair, 
That  the  adventurous  thoughts  that  wander  near  it 
Worship,  and  as  they  kneel  tremble,  and  wear 
The  splendour  of  its  Presence,  and  the  light 
Penetrates  their  dreamlike  frame  «..' 

Till  they  become  charged  with  the  strength  of  flame." 

It  is  this  "strength  of  flame"  which  has  passed  into  the' 
verse  of  Shelley.  *  , 


Xxiv  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

Such  was  the  nature  of  the  man  who  was  to  be  the  su- 
preme exponent  of  the  ideal  of  the  new  democracy.  The 
crude  intellectual  conceptions  of  the  Revolution  enter  the 
Prometheus  Unbound  and  weaken  it;  the  spiritual  sensi- 
tiveness and  spiritual  faith  of  the  Revolution  enter  it  more 
vitally,  and  mould  it  to  an  organic  whole.  The  drama  is 
thus  singularly  uneven.  It  forfeits  at  times  all  imaginative 
power ;  yet  wherever  this  power  diminishes,  its  historic  sug- 
gestiveness  may  be  said  to  increase.  By  virtue  in  part  of  its 
very  imperfections,  by  virtue  supremely  of  the  love  for  hu- 
manity, the  passion  for  freedom  and  the  triumphant  spirit- 
uality which  suffuse  it,  it  is  the  perfect  artistic  reflection  of 
all  that  was  most  significant  in  the  early  aspects  of  the  faith 
which  has  shaped  our  modern  world. 

Fitting  it  is  and  beautiful  that  to  Shelley,  of  all  the  hie- 
rarchy of  poets  then  living,  should  have  been  given  the  mis- 
sion of  perfectly  reflecting  the  dawn  of  the  new  cosmic  day. 
Fair  in  undying  youth,  his  figure  stands  before  us,  its  bright 
and  ardent  purity  undimmed  by  the  breath  of  years.  Fate 
seems  at  first  bitter  and  cruel  when,  in  his  thirtieth  year, 
the  Italian  waters  which  he  loved  so  well  close  over  his 
frail  bark,  and  the  poet-soul  is  borne  darkly,  fearfully,  afar 
into  an  unknown  land.  Yet,  though  he  sings  no  longer  for 
the  sons  of  time,  he  rests,  like  his  own  Adonais,  "  in  those 
abodes  where  the  Eternal  are."  Shelley's  abrupt  and  early 
death  is,  we  may  almost  say,  the  inevitable  conclusion  of  a 
life  whose  work  it  was  to  render  for  us  the  eager  thought,  the 
ardent  faith,  of  adolescence.  The  sober  and  practical  tem- 
per of  middle  life,  the  meditative  calm  of  ao;e,  were  never  to 
touch  his  buoyant  spirit.  He  heralded  the  sunrise  ;  and  his 
task  was  over  when  he  had  sung  his  hymn  of  welcome. 


INTRODUCTION.  XXV 

We  have  said  that  the  Prometheus  Unbound  is  a  myth  ; 
and  so  it  is.  Yet  its  type  is  widely  different  from  thaj:  of 
the  great  stories  of  the  elder  world.  In  our  modern  days 
we  cannot  expect,  we  could  assuredly  not  desire,  the  per- 
fect reproduction  of  an  ancient  poem.  The  Prometheus 
Unbound  is  both  greater  and  less  than  the  early  dreams 
of  Hellas.  In  some  ways  it  is  less.  Inspired  as  a  rule  by 
spontaneous  insight,  it  is  yet  beset  now  and  again  by  a 
clogging  self-consciousness,  and  the  poetry  sinks  into  alle- 
gory, or,  lower  yet,  into  versified  didacticism.  Moreover, 
the  drama  tantalizes  us  with  an  occasional  vagueness  and 
inconsistency  foreign  to  the  ancient  myth.  Yet  if  in  these 
ways  it  is  inferior,  in  others  it  is  instinct  with  a  deeper 
power.  The  past  can  never  be  relived.  The  Prometheus 
is  truly  a  poem  of  youth,  but  the  youth  which  inspires  it  is 
not  that  of  the  first  childhood  of  the  race.  The  world  was, 
indeed,  born  anew  in  those  great  years  at  the  first  of  the 
century ;  but  this  its  new  birth  was  the  birth  of  the  Spirit. 
The  free  naturalism,  strong,  simple,  and  buoyant,  that 
breathes  through  the  myths  of  Greece  was  fled  forever. 
The  rapture  of  physical  existence  is  replaced  in  all  our  later 
poetry  by  the  rapture  of  a  spiritual  hope.  Grave,  with  all  its 
joyous  melody,  is  the  music  of  the  Prometheus ;  the  pain 
that  sounds  through  the  drama  has  a  deeper  note  than  the 
wistful  grief  of  the  child ;  in  the  eyes  of  Prometheus  and  Asia 
is  seen  the  shadow  of  a  suffering  world.  The  ideal  towards 
which  the  drama  presses  is  far  different  from  the  temperate 
uprightness  of  the  Greeks ;  it  is  no  less  than  absolute  union 
with  the  spirit  of  Divine  Love.  For  the  time  when  the  Pro- 
metheus Unbound  is  written  is  the  nineteenth  Christian  cen- 
tury, and  the  vision  of  holiness  has  been  beheld  by  the  world. 


XXVI  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

The  century  has  grown  old  since  Shelley  wrote.  The 
characteristic  utterance  of  its  central  and  final  years  has 
been  that  of  men.  A  Rabbi  Ben  Ezra  reviews  life  in  mem- 
ory, as  a  Prometheus  looked  forward  to  life  in  hope.  Brown- 
ing and  Tennyson  have  reverted  to  that  virile  realism  which 
is  the  most  instinctive  expression  of  our  English  genius ; 
and  this  realism  tends  to  express  itself  in  practical  rather 
than  in  aesthetic  forms.  That  ideal  which  flashed  upon 
men  of  old  as  a  vision,  we  struggle  as  a  fact  to  fulfil.  For 
them  were  the  hours  of  insight ;  for  us  are  the  hours  of 
gloom. 

"  With  aching  hands  and  bleeding  feet 
We  dig  and  heap,  pile  stone  on  stone; 
We  bear  the  burden  and  the  heat 
Of  the  long  day,  and  wish  'twere  done." 

While  we  wait  for  the  "  hours  of  light "  to  return,  it  is  well 
for  us  always  to  remember  that  what  we  are  striving  to 
realize  already  exists  as  a  vision.  The  dream-images  of 
superhuman  beauty,  the  ardent  abstract  enthusiasm,  which 
we  find  in  Shelley,  are  in  truth  the  sources  and  inspiration 
of  that  ^tern  democracy  which,  often  in  painful  forms, 
struggles  towards  a  future  that  we  can  still  but  dimly  see. 
The  economic  science  of  to-day  and  the  imaginative  passion 
of  the  past  are  in  aim  and  essence  one.  We  can  no  longer 
console  ourselves  for  unclean  tenements  by  dreams  of  the 
union  of  Prometheus  and  Asia ;  but  we  may,  in  sober,  dusty 
days  of  discouraged  labor,  refresh  our  spirits  and  revive  our 
faith  by  turning  to  the  glory  of  the  morning,  and  steeping 
our  eyes  in  the  vision  of  an  eternal  prime. 


INTRODUCTION.  xxvii 


II. 
A   STUDY   OF   THE   MYTH. 

THE  student  who  tries  to  translate  the  fleeting  symbolism 
of  the  drama  into  a  logical  sequence  of  abstract  truths  will 
be  grievously  disappointed.  Such  a  translation  is  impos- 
sible. The  union  of  soul  and  form,  meaning  and  expres- 
sion, is  too  close  to  be  severed.  It  has  to  be  seized,  not  by 
the  analytical  reason,  but  by  an  intuition  akin  to  that  of  the 
poet.  We  are  tempted  to  describe  the  myth  in  Shelley's 
own  dazzling  words  :  — 

"  Child  of  light !  thy  limbs  are  burning 

Through  the  vest  which  seems  to  hide  them, 

As  the  radiant  lines  of  morning 

Through  thin  clouds,  ere  they  divide  them; 

And  this  atmosphere  divinest 

Shrouds  thee  wheresoe'er  thou  shinest." 

To  conceal  while  it  reveals  is  always  the  characteristic  of 
the  myth.  The  drama  transports  us  to  the  very  confines 
of  the  world  of  sense,  where  material  semblance  trembles 
into  spiritual  truth ;  but  the  limit  is  never  quite  crossed,  the 
reticence  of  the  image  is  never  forfeited.  "As  dew-stars 
glisten,  then  fade  away,"  gleams  of  spiritual  meaning  Hash 
and  vanish  through  the  poem.  The  imagination  every- 
where suggests  what  the  intellect  cannot  define. 


XXviii  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

We  must  acknowledge  another  reason  for  the  obscurity  of 
many  passages  in  the  Prometheus.  The  drama  is  uneven 
both  in  form  and  thought ;  and  one  is  sometimes  tempted 
to  linger  in  search  of  hidden  depth  of  meaning,  when  true 
wisdom  would  recognize  a  passage  as  impenetrable  simply 
because  shallow.  It  is  because  of  this  twofold  difficulty  in 
logical  interpretation  that  many,  even  among  the  lovers  of 
Shelley,  give  up  the  attempt  to  trace  the  evolution  of  any 
theme,  and  enjoy  the  drama  simply  as  a  succession  of  shin- 
ing pictures  and  lovely  melodies.  Yet  in  reality  the  drama 
is  a  highly  organized  whole,  conceived  with  the  greatest 
,  care  and  with  elaborate  fulness  of  meaning.  We  know,  on 
Mrs.  Shelley's  authority,  that  Shelley  wrote  every  detail  of 
the  poem  with  distinct  intention.  His  sensitive  soul  was 
attuned  not  only  to  harmonies  of  light  and  color,  but  to  the 
severer  music  of  the  experiences  of  life.  Such  a  nature  is 
no  pioneer  in  constructive  ideas.  We  do  not  look  in  Shelley 
for  the  virile  intellectuality,  the  grasp  on  practical  problems, 
of  Browning ;  but  we  do  seek  and  find  that  intuitive  reflec- 
tion of  the  vital  elements  in  contemporary  life  and  thought 
which  is  characteristic  of  the  seer. 

Now,  although  in  many  a  detail  the  meaning  of  the  myth 
eludes  us,  in  grand  outlines  it  may  be  traced.  Without  try- 
ing to  translate  the  poem  into  a  series  of  moral  maxims, 
it  is  quite  possible  to  apprehend  something  of  the  broader 
relations  which  its  imagery  bears  to  the  facts  of  human  life. 
Such  an  apprehension  is  essential  to  the  best  enjoyment  of 
the  drama. 

Shelley  takes  as  his  starting-point  the  old  story  of  Prome- 
theus, as  found  in  the  drama  of  ^Eschylus.  Prometheus  the 
Titan  has  stolen  fire  from  heaven  to  benefit  the  race  of  man. 


INTRODUCTION.  xxix 

In  punishment  Jupiter  nails  him  high  on  a  cliff  of  Caucasus, 
where  he  hangs,  suffering  tortures  untold.  He  possesses  a 
secret  which,  if  revealed,  will  ward  off  from  Jupiter  some  un- 
known and  terrible  danger;  with  this  secret  he  refuses  to 
part.  These  broad  and  simple  facts  Shelley  adopts  from  the 
old  Greek  myth ;  then,  with  an  audacious  license  born  of 
the  Revolution,  he  modifies,  enlarges,  innovates,  to  suit  his 
own  desires,  till  the  glowing  and  complex  phantasmagoria 
of  his  drama  bears  likeness  slight  indeed  to  the  grave  and 
simple  austerity  of  the  ^Eschylean  treatment. 

When  the  drama  opens,  Prometheus,  great  protagonist  of 
humanity,  hangs  on  his  mount  of  torture,  high  above  the 
outspread  world.  But  he  is  not  alone.  Sister-spirits,  lone 
and  Panthea  —  fair  forms  with  drooping  wings  —  sit  watch- 
ful at  his  feet.  They  may  be  with  him  :  another  presence, 
dearer  than  theirs,  is  denied.  Asia,  their  great  sister,  the 
beloved  of  Prometheus,  awaits  afar  in  sorrow;  and  the 
bitterest  element  in  the  suffering  of  the  Titan  is  the  separa- 
tion decreed  between  himself  and  her. 

This  first  act  may  be  entitled  "The  Torture  of  Prome- 
theus." The  agony  which  Jupiter  has  power  to  inflict  shall 
reach  its  bitter  climax  here.  Prometheus,  disciplined  by 
aeons  of  silent  pain,  has  attained  a  new  point  of  develop- 
ment. After  a  grand  opening  soliloquy,  he  utters  a  petition. 
At  the  moment  of  his  capture  he  has  hurled  defiance  at 
Jupiter,  his  foe,  in  a  terrific  curse.  This  curse  he  would  now 
recall.  Hatred  has  left  his  soul ;  even  the  words  of  wrath 
and  contempt  he  has  forgotten.  Let  them  be  repeated, 
that  he  may  revoke  them  and  thus  remain  free  from*  the 
taint  of  revenge.  But  it  is  in  vain  that  he  entreats  all  powers 
of  earth  and  air  to  repeat  the  curse  to  him.  They  remember 


XXX  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

it  well ;  repeat  it  they  dare  not ;  till  at  last,  from  a  strange 
underworld  of  shadows,  the  Phantasm  of  Jupiter  appears, 
proud  and  calm,  and  pronounces  the  dread  words.  Prome- 
theus in  pity  recalls  them.  Jupiter,  from  Olympus,  cognizant 
doubtless  of  all  that  passes  on  the  Mount,  and  thinking  the 
revocation  to  betoken  relenting  on  the  part  of  Prometheus, 
sends  Mercury  swiftly  down  to  extort  the  longed-for  secret, 
and  to  inflict  new  pains  if  the  Titan  prove  rebellious.  Him 
Prometheus  repulses  with  words  of  lofty  scorn  and  invulner- 
able will.  Forgiveness  has  implied  no  weakening  of  his  firm 
integrity.  Then  comes  the  great  scene  of  torture.  Throngs 
of  Furies — awful  Forms  of  Darkness  —  surge  upward  from 
the  abyss.  They  press  around  Prometheus,  a  stifling,  evil 
crowd ;  they  taunt  him,  they  revile,  they  torment.  Every 
spiritual  agony  that  the  soul  can  know  do  they  inflict  upon 
him.  Yet  though  his  soul  is  sorrowful  unto  death,  it  is  not 
conquered.  To  the  temptation  of  despair  he  does  not  yield, 
if  despair  mean  the  loss  of  inward  loyalty  to  truth  and  right ; 
and  the  baffled  Furies  vanish  in  rage.  Then  gather  to  con- 
sole the  weary  Titan  a  troop  of  exquisite  spirits.  Their  gen- 
tle songs  soothe  though  they  cannot  cheer  the  exhausted  soul 
of  the  sufferer.  He  hangs,  weary,  yet  at  peace  ;  the  morn- 
ing slowly  dawns ;  and  we  leave  him  as  his  wistful  thoughts 
turn  towards  Asia  and  towards  Love. 

If  the  first  act  is  "The  Torture  of  Prometheus,"  the 
second  may  be  called  "  The  Journey  of  Asia."  It  is  around 
her  figure  that  action  now  centres.  In  the  beginning  of  the 
act  we  find  her  waiting  in  an  Indian  vale,  whose  luxuriant 
beauty  contrasts  strangely  with  the  bleak  ravine  where  Pro- 
metheus suffers.  Yet  Asia,  too,  is  sorrowful,  though  her  sor- 
row is  passive.  Separated  from  Prometheus,  she  languidly 


INTRODUCTION.  XXXI 

waits  and  dreams.  She  is  to  learn  that  her  mission  is  not 
only  to  endure  but  to  act,  and  through  action  to  save  the 
world. 

The  moment  is  sunrise.  Panthea  comes,  with  messages 
from  Prometheus.  Panthea,  as  our  detailed  study  will  show 
us,  is  the  Spirit  of  Intuition,  or  Faith,  which  ever  mediates 
between  the  soul  of  man  and  its  ideal.  She  has  strange 
dreams  to  narrate — dreams  of  mystic  meaning  that  summon 
to  an  action  unknown.  In  the  eyes  of  Panthea,  Asia  be- 
holds these  dreams.  The  first  is  the  Vision  of  Fulfilment,  — 
Prometheus  joyous  and  free.  The  second  is  the  Dream  of 
Progress ;  and  as  Asia  beholds  it,  the  impulses  of  her  own 
brooding  heart  become  clear  to  her.  The  cliffs  around 
become  vocal  with  echoes  that  call  on  her  to  go  forth.  She 
must  hence,  she  knows  not  whither.  Nature,  which  has 
been  but  the  passive  reflection  of  her  beauty,  becomes 
charged  with  spiritual  significance.  It  stings  with  hunger 
for  full  light,  it  murmurs  a  message  half-understood  of  a 
task  that  awaits,  a  reward  to  be  won.  We  are  here,  in 
the  drama  of  spiritual  evolution,  at  the  great  point  of  the 
awakening  of  consciousness.  Driven  by  an  imperious  in- 
ward stress,  Asia  seizes  the  hand  of  Panthea,  and  with  her 
starts  on  a  strange  journey.  Through  the  dark  forest  of 
human  experience  they  wander,  —  bound,  though  they  know 
it  not,  on  a  pilgrimage  of  redemption.  They  pause  on  a 
mountain  summit,  and,  abandoning  self-guidance,  yield  in 
meekness  to  radiant  spirit-forces  not  their  own.  Into  the 
secret  abysses  of  Being  they  are  carried,  to  the  presence,  of 
the  awful  Demogorgon,  the  unseen  Fate  that  dwells  in  dark- 
ness. This  descent  of  Asia  to  the  cave  of  Demogorgon 
recalls  the  descent  of  Faust  to  the  "  Mothers  "  —  the  hidden 


XXX11  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

roots  of  things  —  in  the  second  part  of  Faust ;  it  recalls 
yet  more  forcibly  that  fairest  myth  of  the  ancient  world,  the 
descent  of  Psyche  to  the  shades  of  Avernus. 

In  the  presence  of  this  oracular  Darkness,  which  is  yet  a 
Living  Spirit,  Asia  seeks  satisfaction  in  her  perplexed  brood- 
ings  over  life  and  evil,  and  finally  questions  the  fate  of  Pro- 
metheus and  herself.  The  answers  come  in  deed,  not  word. 
Swiftly  appears  a  vision  of  the  Cars  of  the  Hours;  swiftly 
the  awful  Form  of  Demogorgon  floats  upward  to  the  car  of 
darkness,  while  Asia  and  Panthea,  transported  to  a  shining 
chariot,  are  whirled  more  swiftly  than  the  lightning  to  a  mys- 
tic mount.  Then  comes  the  great  consummation  of  the 
drama.  Asia  is  transfigured  before  us.  Her  being  glows 
with  a  strange  radiance,  so  intense  that  it  hides  her  from  the 
view.  A  Voice — the  Voice  of  Prometheus — is  heard  chant- 
ing to  her  a  worshipful  lyric,  the  highest  expression  alike  of 
Shelley's  genius  and  of  his  faith ;  and  with  her  responsive 
song,  of  almost  equal  beauty,  and  of  profound  meaning,  the 
act  concludes. 

The  apotheosis  of  Asia  is  the  climax  of  the  spiritual 
drama.  But  in  the  third  act  we  witness  the  Fall  of  Jupiter 
and  the  Liberation  of  Prometheus.  Jupiter  has  just  married 
Thetis.  The  child  of  this  union  ( here  is  the  secret  which 
Prometheus  has  so  persistently  withheld )  is  to  destroy  his 
father.  Strange  child  !  For  in  truth  he  is  no  other  than 
an  incarnation  of  Demogorgon.  In  a  horror  of  great  dark- 
ness he  ascends  to  the  resplendent  throne  of  the  world's 
ruler  and  pronounces  doom.  Scorn  avails  nothing,  the 
weapons  of  the  gods  are  futile,  futile  thunderbolts  and 
prayers.  The  curse  is  fulfilled.  From  high  heaven  Jupiter 
falls  into  the  abyss, — 


INTRODUCTION,  xxxiii 

"  And  like  a  cloud  his  enemy  above 
Darkens  his  fall  with  victory." 

Hercules  releases  Prometheus,  who,  reunited  to  Asia, 
enters  upon  an  existence  of  limitless  freedom  and  perfect 
love.  The  Spirit  of  the  Hour  speeds,  proclaiming  redemp- 
tion over  land  and  sea ;  and  with  a  long  passage  describing 
the  joyful  effects  of  his  tidings  the  act  concludes.  The 
fourth  act  was  an  afterthought  which  we  could  ill  afford  to 
miss.  It  is  a  triumphal  chorus  of  rejoicing.  All  powers  of 
earth  and  air,  of  the  natural  and  the  spiritual  world,  unite  in 
a  wondrous  paean  that  for  depth  and  variety  of  music,  for 
beauty  of  imagery,  for  the  expression  of  rapturous  gladness, 
finds  no  parallel  in  English  verse.  It  is  to  music  rather  than 
to  literature  that  we  must  look  for  the  analogues  of  poetry 
such  as  this. 

Here,  then,  in  broad  outline,  is  the  story  of  the  Prome- 
theus Unbound.  Many  details  it  has  which  we  have  not 
mentioned,  but  these  will  fall  into  place  in  the  study  of  the 
drama  itself.  What,  now,  is  its  meaning?  Is  it  anything 
more  than  a  panorama  of  glowing  forms  and  a  sequence  of 
wondrous  melodies?  And  if  so,  what? 

It  is  a  drama  of  the  redemption  of  humanity ;  and  the 
need  and  method  of  redemption  are  conceived  as  they  could 
be  conceived  under  the  influence  of  the  new  democratic 
faith  alone. 

Prometheus  is  the  representative  of  all  humanity.  He 
suffers,  oppressed  by  the  tyranny  of  Jupiter ;  yet  it  is  from 
Prometheus  himself — and  in  this  Shelley  follows  the  Greek 
myth  —  that  all  the  power  of  Jupiter  is  derived.  We  must 
be  careful  not  to  consider  Jupiter  as  the  abstract  power  of 
moral  evil.  To  Shelley  his  significance  is  mainly,  perhaps, 


xxxiv  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

political.     A  few  lines  near  the  conclusion  of  the  drama 
give  the  clew  to  him  :  — 

' '  Those  foul  shapes,  abhorred  by  god  and  man, 
Which,  under  many  a  name  and  many  a  form, 
Strange,  savage,  ghastly,  dark,  and  execrable, 
Were  Jupiter,  the  tyrant  of  the  world." 

He  stands  for  all  those  institutions,  civil  and  religious,  which 
were  once  the  true  expression  of  the  will  of  man,  but  which, 
as  the  centuries  have  passed,  become  effete  forms,  still 
powerful  to  bind,  and  with  an  innate  tendency  to  repress 
progress.  "Thrones,  altars,  judgment-seats,  and  prisons, "- 
these,  in  one  grand  composite,  comprising  as  they  do  all 
the  forms  by  which  man  has  projected  into  the  world  the 
authority  of  Law,  unite  in  the  idea  of  Jupiter.  But  while 
Jupiter  has  thus  rather  an  historic  and  outward  than  an 
ethical  and  inward  meaning,  we  must  not  forget  that  he 
practically  represents  all  the  evil  recognized  by  the  poet ; 
for  "Shelley  believed,"  so  Mrs.  Shelley  tells  us,  "that  man- 
kind had  only  to  will  that  there  should  be  no  evil  and  there 
would  be  none."  Evil  is  an  accident  of  the  outer  life, 
and  thus,  naturally  enough,  inheres  exclusively  in  that  out- 
ward authority  which  checks  the  free  play  of  impulse. 
The  evil  Jupiter,  thus  conceived,  is  a  shadowy  creature 
enough.  Almost  may  we  say  that  he  has  no  real  existence, 
and  accordingly  throughout  the  drama  he  never  possesses 
the  imagination.  It  is  by  his  own  weight  that  he  falls. 
He  is  made,  in  the  first  act,  to  pronounce  his  own  curse, 
and  his  destruction  is  wrought  by  his  offspring.  In  the 
marriage  of  Jupiter  and  Thetis,  Shelley  seems  to  portray 
the  overweening  arrogance  and  v/3/sts  through  which  a  polit- 
ical tyranny  invests  itself  with  the  pomp  of  false  glory, 


INTRODUCTION.  XXXV 

and  which  always  precedes  its  overthrow.  The  form  of 
Demogorgon  assumed  by  the  child  of  this  fateful  union  is 
the  most  difficult  in  the  whole  drama  to  apprehend,  but  we 
can  see  one  or  two  simple  thoughts  for  which  he  stands. 
In  his  aspect  as  child  of  Jupiter  and  Thetis,  Demogorgon 
undoubtedly  means  Revolution ;  that  revolution  which  al- 
ways follows  the  marriage  of  unrighteous  power  to  over- 
weening display.  Viewed  from  the  intellectual  side  of  the 
historical  sequence  here  suggested,  Demogorgon  stands  for 
the  critical  and  destructive  thought  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, which,  nurtured  under  a  false  and  artificial  civilization, 
was  the  revolutionary  force  by  which  that  civilization  was 
overthrown.  Thus  we  are  led  to  the  deeper  aspects  of  the 
strange  conception, — a  conception  which  we  can  neither  de- 
fine nor  understand,  because  Shelley  doubtless  meant  Dem- 
ogorgon to  represent  that  background  of  inscrutable  mystery 
in  existence  which  is  at  once  the  source  and  negation  of  all 
our  knowledge.  We  may  call  him  Fate,  if  we  will ;  yet  there 
is  another  fate  behind  him.  We  may  call  him  Wisdom,  yet 
there  is  much  which  he  seemingly  does  not  know.  He  has 
been  compared  to  the  Hegelian  Absolute,  that  "  Union  of 
Contradictories  "  which  is  nothing  and  yet  all.  The  most 
useful  way  to  think  of  him  is  as  the  Principle  of  Reason ; 
Reason  not  indeed  omniscient,  but  the  best  instrument  man 
possesses  for  the  approach  to  absolute  truth.  Lying  deep  in 
the  unconscious  life  of  humanity,  this  Reason  is  passionless 
and  passive ;  yet  now  and  again  it  will  be  roused,  it  will 
arise,  and,  appearing  in  time  under  the  aspect  of  some  relent- 
less phase  of  thought,  will  sweep  down  the  old  and  sink  once 
more  into  silence.  Most  interesting  is  the  way  in  which  this 
action  of  Demogorgon  is  brought  about  by  Shelley.  The 


XXX vi  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

obvious  cause  is  the  overweening  arrogance  of  Jupiter ;  but 
another  more  potent  cause  lies  deep  in  the  secret  mysteries 
of  being.  For  in  the  abode  of  darkness,  Asia,  Spirit  of 
Divine  Love,  has  met  Demogorgon.  Face  to  face  she  has 
spoken  with  him  ;  and  it  is  only  after  this  interview  that  the 
"mighty  shadow"  floats  upward  from  his  throne.  Surely 
the  poet  here  means  to  image  to  us  the  profound  truth,  that 
it  is  only  through  contact  with  emotion  that  abstract  thought 
can  become  roused  to  action  and  appear  in  the  sphere  of 
practical  life,  a  vital  and  dynamic  power.  We  have  here  a 
clear  suggestion  of  that  revolutionary  process  by  which  the 
frigid  and  inert  reasoning  of  Voltaire  and  his  kin,  becoming 
charged  with  passion,  overthrew  the  ancient  world. 

Thus  the  self-destruction  of  evil  is  accomplished,  and  on 
the  negative  side  the  process  of  redemption  is  complete  : 
but  in  the  evolution  of  the  myth  there  is  another  and  positive 
aspect  of  far  greater  beauty.  The  uplift  of  humanity  is 
achieved  not  only  through  the  overthrow  of  evil  but  through 
the  active  force  of  good.  Not  directly  through  the  action  of 
Prometheus.  True  to  his  doctrine  of  non-resistance,  Shelley 
allows  his  Titan  to  play  no  part  in  his  own  salvation,  unless 
by  the  patient  and  heroic  endurance  of  his  pain.  Through 
Asia,  the  spirit  of  celestial  love,  shall  redemption  be  worked 
out :  Asia,  the  Light  of  Life,  highest  embodiment  in  Shelley's 
poetry  of  that  Ideal  towards  which  his  worship  ever  ascends. 

The  second  act,  in  which  the  myth  of  Asia  is  unfolded, 
is  poetically  the  most  wonderful  in  the  Prometheus  Un- 
bound, —  that  is  to  say,  in  the  whole  cycle  of  English  song. 
The  verse  palpitates  with  spiritual  meaning,  profound  yet 
elusive.  It  dazzles  us  like  the  sky  at  sunrise,  yet  like  the 
sky  at  sunrise  purges  our  eyes  to  clearer  sight.  It  is  a  myth 


INTR  OD  UCTIOtf.  XXXVli 

of  spiritual  evolution,  dealing  with  the  moment  when  Love, 
hitherto  content  to  dream  and  suffer,  is  aroused  to  action 
and  to  thought.  We  have  already  spoken  of  the  long 
journey  to  which  the  sister-spirits,  Love  and  Faith,  are 
driven  by  their  dreams  and  by  the  voices  of  nature.  At 
last,  as  we  saw,  they  are  drawn  downward  into  the  abysses 
of  being.  Asia  stands  before  Demogorgon  ;  Love  questions 
Ancient  Wisdom.  She  asks  a  solution  of  the  problems  of 
existence,  —  asks  and  is  answered.  The  response  does  but 
corroborate  the  yearning  intuition  of  her  own  heart.  Love 
is  supreme,  Love  is  eternal !  This  is  the  deepest  word  the 
human  reason  deigns  to  speak.  And  it  is  enough.  Demo- 
gorgon, as  we  saw,  is  roused  to  activity  by  his  meeting  with 
Asia.  To  Asia,  also,  the  interview  is  a  crisis.  If  reason  must 
be  charged  with  passion  before  it  can  prevail,  love  on  the 
other  hand  must  become  instinct  with  wisdom  before  it  can 
be  made  manifest  in  that  glory  which  shall  save  the  world. 
Yet  this  new  wisdom  does  but  reiterate  the  primal  instinct  of 
Love.  Tennyson's  In  Memoriam  is  the  typical  poem  of  the 
middle  of  the  century,  as  Shelley's  Prometheus  Unbound  of 
its  earlier  years.  And  the  central  message  of  both  poems 
is  the  same.  Love  Immortal  is  sung  by  both  alike ;  Love 
discerned  immortal  first  by  the  yearning  of  the  eager  heart, 
proved  immortal  only  by  wearisome  journey  of  thought 
through  the  dark  and  lonely  regions  of  soul-experience. 
After  her  interview  with  Demogorgon,  the  power  of  Asia  is 
set  free.  Love  is  transfigured.  Its  rosy  warmth  pervades 
the  whole  creation,  and  its  power  is  revealed  triumphantly 
supreme.  This  is  the  act  through  which,  in  the  secret 
mystery  of  creation,  the  redemption  of  Prometheus  is^ 
achieved.  Thus  through  a  double  process,  destructive  and 


XXXviii  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

constru  tive,  —  by  revolution  and  by  love,  —  is  set  free  the 
human  soul.  At  this  point,  the  Prometheus  Unbound  ceases 
to  be  great.  When  redemption  is  achieved,  when  the 
drama  turns  from  hope  and  endurance,  and  endeavors  to 
picture  fulfilment,  the  poem  drops  into  bathos.  Weak,  sen- 
timental, empty, — guilty  of  that  worst  of  aesthetic  sins,  pretti- 
ness, — is  Shelley's  description  of  the  ideal  state.  After  their 
titanic  throes,  (heir  radiant  achievement,  Prometheus  and 
Asia  are  united.  Surely  the  progressive  rapture  of  their  life 
will  at  least  m  glorious  hint  form  the  conclusion  of  the  drama. 
Not  so.  They  retire  to  a  certain  cave ;  there,  like  Arca- 
dian shepherd  and  shepherdess,  they  live  their  passive  days, 
listening  to  the  echoes  of  the  human  world  and  finding 
supreme  joy  in  the  development  of  the  arts.  For  a  regen- 
erate humanity,  Shelley  had  no  message.  His  ideal  is 
radically  unprogressive,  —  the  return  to  a  Golden  Age  of 
pastoral  innocence,  rather  than  the  advance  into  new  regions 
ot  material  and  spiritual  conquest.  "  Equal,  unclassed,  tribe- 
less  and  nationless,  exempt  from  awe,  worship,  degree,"  is  the 
humanity  of  the  future ;  and  the  poetry  is  flat,  the  thought 
is  even  flatter,  in  which  its  life  is  described. 

In  part,  this  descent  into  bathos  is  inevitable.  All  at- 
tempts to  describe  an  unknown  millennium  must  needs  be 
futile ;  even  the  Apocalypse  deals  only  in  guarded  and  rev- 
erent symbol,  and  all  uninspired  books,  from  Plato  to 
"  News  from  Nowhere,"  fail  to  attract  us  from  our  present 
miseries  to  their  insipid  ideal.  Yet  Shelley's  presentation 
has  a  peculiar  weakness.  It  is  the  weakness  inherent  in  the 
whole  Revolutionary  ideal,  and  may  be  summed  up  in  two 
defects.  We  have  hinted  at  both  of  them  before.  The  first 
defect  is  the  entire  absence  in  the  Prometheus  Unbound 


INTRODUCTION.  xxxix 

of  the  modern  scientific  conception  of  Law  and  Evolution ; 
the  second  is  the  vagueness  of  the  religious  ideas  of  the 
poem.  The  idea  of  progressive  development  was  unknown 
to  the  men  of  the  Revolution.  In  their  thought,  salvation 
was  to  be  reached  by  a  sudden  overthrow  of  tyrants  rather 
than  by  a  slow  and  constructive  upbuilding.  The  ideal  state, 
when  reached,  was  to  be  one  of  stagnant  and  empty  enjoy- 
ment, rather  than  one  of  continual  advance  through  struggle. 
All  development  is  conditioned  by  law,  and  the  thought  of 
law  is  abhorrent  to  them.  The  invertebrate  society  de- 
scribed in  the  third  act  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound  is 
the  inevitable  outcome  of  a  state  of  pure  anarchy ;  and 
anarchy  as  an  ideal  ought  to  have  been  made  impossible  for 
us  to-day  by  the  teachings  of  modern  science.  Yet  what 
we  miss  in  the  Prometheus  Unbound  is  deeper  even  than 
the  sense  of  the  sacredness  of  law  or  the  grandeur  of  devel- 
opment. We  feel  the  lack  of  any  definiteness  in  the  religious 
thought  of  the  poem.  The  interpretation  of  evil  is  hope- 
lessly superficial ;  not  only  does  it  ignore  the  scientific 
aspect  of  evil  as  imperfect  development,  but  also  the  far 
deeper  and  truer  aspect  of  evil  as  Sin.  To  represent  out- 
ward authority  as  the  only  force  that  hampers  the  free  purity  of 
man,  is  simply  to  be  false  to  fact.  The  absence,  in  the  drama, 
of  any  outlook  towards  immortality  or  any  suggestion  of 
the  Divine  Fatherhood  is  the  final  source  of  its  weakness. 
Shut  off  from  any  hope  of  endless  growth  towards  an  infinite 
perfection  in  the  hereafter,  shut  in  upon  himself  with  no  per- 
sonal ideal  towards  which  he  can  strive,  nor  spiritual  strength 
on  which  he  can  depend,  it  is  no  wonder  that  man,  as  Shel- 
ley depicts  him,  is  a  creature  of  no  personality,  scarcely 
higher,  except  for  his  aesthetic  instincts,  than  an  amiable  brute. 


xl  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

Thus  the  crudity  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound  is  the 
crudity  of  the  Revolution :  its  strength  also  is  largely  the 
strength  of  the  Revolution.  When  we  look  upon  the  drama 
as  a  whole,  the  surface  inconsistencies,  the  deeper  errors, 
vanish  from  our  thoughts,  and  leave  a  work  of  resplendent 
insight.  The  weakness  is  of  the  intellect ;  the  strength  is 
of  the  spirit. 

The  controlling  inspiration  of  Shelley's  verse  is  the  great 
passion  of  his  day.  Far  above  its  crude  convictions  soared 
the  clear  faith  of  the  new  democratic  ideal.  The  elements 
of  this  faith  are  eternal.  The  first  is  a  profound  love  for 
humanity,  a  sympathy  for  all  the  woes  of  a  suffering  world. 
This  love,  this  sympathy,  burn  on  every  page  of  the  Pro- 
metheus Unbound.  The  next  is  the  passion  for  freedom ; 
such  passion  irradiates  the  drama.  Last  and  greatest  note 
of  the  democratic  ideal  is  the  spirit  of  a  deathless  hope  ;  and 
the  serene  assurance  that  evil  shall  be  conquered  by  the 
might  of  love  is  the  soul  of  Shelley's  poem.  Through  its 
every  line  breathes  a  hope  that  can  neither  falter  nor  repent, 
supreme  in  torture,  triumphant  over  despair.  The  verse  is 
suffused  with  the  light  of  it,  and  gleams  with  the  radiance 
of  dawn.  The  Prometheus  Unbound  is  a  poem  of  the 
sunrise :  — 

"  The  point  of  one  white  star  is  quivering  still 
Far  in  the  orange  light  of  widening  dawn 
Beyond  the  purple  mountains." 

Attainment  in  the  drama  there  is  none ;  of  rest  it  has  no 
message.  It  is  a  cloud-capped  morning  vision,  with  some- 
thing of  the  elusiveness,  the  swift  transitions,  the  shining 
mystery  of  the  cloud.  As  such,  we  must  receive  it.  The 
age  was  one  of  promise,  not  of  achievement,  and  we  wrong 


INTRODUCTION.  xli 

its  greatest  poem  when  we  search  it  for  something  which 
the  age  could  not  bestow.  The  Prometheus  Unbound 
is  the  Drama  of  Hope.  The  time  has  not  come  yet  —  it 
may  come  in  some  far-distant  day  —  when  a  new  Shelley 
shall  write  for  a  rejoicing  world  the  Drama  of  Fulfilment. 


xlii  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 


III. 
THE  DRAMA  AS  A  WORK  OF  ART. 

IT  is  a  thankless  task  to  "unweave  a  rainbow."  The 
iridescent  beauty  of  Shelley's  poems  stimulates  the  spirit  of 
joy  rather  than  that  of  analysis.  The  historic  position  and 
inner  significance  of  a  poem  may  be  made  clearer  by  com- 
ment, but  its  charm  as  a  work  of  art  vanishes  on  close  in- 
spection, as  the  lights  in  a  dew-drop  die  away  under  the 
microscope.  The  exquisite  lines  of  Blake  are  peculiarly 
true  of  the  appreciation  of  poetry  :  — 

"  He  who  bends  to  himself  a  joy 
Shall  the  winged  life  destroy, 
But  he  who  kisses  the  joy  as  it  flies 
Lives  in  eternity's  sunrise." 

Thus  the  suggestions  which  it  seems  wise  to  make 
concerning  the  artistic  power  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound 
will  ieek,  not  to  guide  analysis,  but  to  quicken  receptivity. 
A  poet's  achievement  is  always  largely  determined  by  his 
temperament.  This,  true  of  all  poets,  is  especially  true  of 
Shelley.  As  we  have  seen,  he  is  a  pure  idealist.  The  chief 
notes  of  his  temperament  are  two  :  an  intense  sensitiveness 
and  a  passion  for  change.  The  nature  of  Shelley,  like  that 
of  Browning's  St.  John, 

"  Shudderingly,  scarce  a  shred  between, 
Lies  bare  to  the  universal  prick  of  light." 


INTRODUCTION.  xliii 

Not  only  "music  and  moonlight  and  feeling,"  but  color, 
odor,  form  —  yes,  pain  and  pleasure  —  were  one  to  Shelley. 
He  describes  his  own  dominant  mood  in  the  words  of  the 
little  Spirit  of  the  Earth  :  — 

"  It  was,  as  it  still  is,  the  pain  of  bliss, 
To  move,  to  breathe,  to  be." 

This  poignant  sensitiveness  leads  him  to  a  marvellous 
fineness  of  perception ;  but  his  passion  for  change  deter- 
mines the  sphere  within  which  his  perception  shall  act. 
Keats  is  as  responsive  as  Shelley  to  subtle  sense-impressions ; 
Wordsworth's  eye  and  ear  had  a  fairy  fineness.  But  Words- 
worth and  Keats  alike,  though  from  different  reasons  — 
Wordsworth  from  spiritual  instinct,  Keats  from  aesthetic 
instinct  —  reflected  most  readily  moods  of  repose.  The 
themes  which  both  love  to  render  are  themes  of  peace. 
Shelley's  spirit  is  of  a  different  order.  He  is  possessed  by 
the  vision  of  such  elusive  loveliness  as  vanishes  for  most  of 
us  even  before  it  is  beheld.  He  is  the  poet  of  motion,  of 
half-tints  and  passing  moods ;  his  glancing  restlessness  ren- 
ders him  interpreter  of  all  that  is  fugitive  in  nature  and  the 
mind  of  man. 

All  Shelley's  poetry  is  subtly  pervaded  by  his  personality  : 
but  nowhere  else  do  we  find  so  perfect  an  expression  of  his 
nature  as  in  the  Prometheus  Unbound.  His  idealism,  his 
sensitiveness,  his  tremulous  restlessness,  are  in  every  line. 
To  the  heaven  of  Shelley's  mind  the  drama  is  like 

"  The  sea,  in  storm  or  calm, 
Heaven's  ever-changing  shadow,  spread  below." 

It  has  a  dream-like  beauty,  due  in  part  to  the  pervading 
sense  of  spiritual  realities  thinly  concealed,  in  part  to  the 


xliv  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

wonderful  delicacy  with  which  it  suggests  rather  than  ren- 
ders the  most  fugitive  aspects  of  nature  and  of  feeling. 

But  the  Prometheus  Unbound  is  more  than  a  reflec- 
tion of  Shelley's  temperament ;  it  reveals  his  highest  power, 
a  power  which  otherwise  we  might  never  have  known  him 
to  possess.  The  drama  is  no  mere  succession  of  exquisite 
details  ;  it  has  a  noble  and  organic  unity.  Matthew  Arnold 
tells  us  that  a  "high  architectonic  faculty"  must  always 
accompany  complete  poetic  development.  Ruskin  calls 
this  faculty  the  Imagination  Associative ;  call  it  what  we 
will,  it  is  the  power  which  unites  many  imperfect  parts  into 
a  perfect  whole.  It  presides,  Arnold  says,  at  the  evolution 
of  works  like  the  Agamemnon  or  the  Antigone.  Com- 
paratively simple  in  manifestation  through  the  tragic  drama 
of  the  Greeks,  it  finds  fullest  expression  in  the  complex  yet 
organic  construction  of  the  Shakespearean  drama.  In  the 
majority  of  Shelley's  poems,  devoid  as  they  are  of  all  dra- 
matic elements,  there  is  perhaps  no  place  for  this  power. 
His  minor  lyrics  are  but  a  single  strain,  though  sometimes, 
as  in  the  Ode  to  the  West  Wind,  the  varied  development 
of  the  emotional  theme  through  a  noble  sequence  of  stanzas 
gives  to  the  poem  an  inward  harmony  which  suggests  high 
constructive  instinct.  The  Adonais,  again,  is  finely  organ- 
ized, though  the  articulation  of  parts  is  here  somewhat 
artificial,  owing  to  the  closeness  with  which  the  poem  follows 
classic  models.  But  in  the  Prometheus  Unbound,  Shelley 
finally  and  completely  vindicates  his  claim  to  the  architec- 
tonic faculty.  His  is  not  the  Shakespearean  power  of  dra- 
matic construction,  dependent  on  the  clash  of  character 
with  event ;  neither  is  it  exactly  the  intellectual  power  shown 
in  a  noble  development  of  thought-experience,  like  Tenny 


INTR  OD  UCTION.  xlv 

son's  in  the  In  Memoriam.  Shelley's  power  is  more  akin 
to  that  of  the  musician;  from  a  simple  melodic  theme 
he  evolves  a  vast  whole  of  ordered  harmony.  The  Pro- 
metheus Unbound  is  like  a  symphony  or  oratorio,  where 
the  music,  exquisite  at  every  point,  is  modulated  with  won- 
drous beauty  and  subtlety  into  a  grandly  progressive  whole. 
To  translate  the  drama  into  terms  of  music  is,  indeed,  a 
fascinating  and  feasible  experiment.  The  unity  of  the  poem, 
then,  since  akin  to  the  unity  of  music,  is  primarily  emo- 
tional ;  and  surely  no  emotional  theme  was  ever  discovered 
deeper  and  wider  in  scope,  fuller  of  varied  imaginative 
suggestion,  than  that  of  this  Drama  of  Redemption. 

Each  act  of  the  Prometheus  centres  in  a  distinct  phase 
of  the  one  theme.  The  first  act,  expressing  the  calm  of 
proud  endurance,  breaks  towards  the  middle  into  an  agony 
still  passive  and  at  the  end  sinks  into  the  peace  of  exhaus- 
tion. The  second  act  is  one  of  hope  and  promise :  if  the 
first  centres  in  endurance,  this  centres  in  action.  The  spirit 
of  life  palpitates  through  every  line.  Faint  at  first,  as  Asia 
waits  in  lovely  passiveness,  it  grows  more  eager,  stronger, 
till  it  culminates  in  the  marvellous  lyric  which  brings  us  close 
to  Goethe's  Werdelust  —  the  creative  rapture  of  the  soul 
of  the  world.  The  third  act  is  the  calm  of  fulfilment,  as  the 
first  was  the  calm  of  endurance.  In  the  fourth  act,  a  lyrical 
afterthought,  the  full  paean  of  triumph  sweeps  us  along  with 
tumultuous  and  unequalled  harmony. 

Now  these  moods  —  enduring  expectation,  life  slowly 
quickened  to  full  activity,  fulfilment,  and  triumph  —  find 
expression,  not  alone  through  the  thought  of  the  poem,  but 
through  its  form.  They  interpenetrate  its  very  structure/ 
and  mould  every  line  of  its  verse.  The  treatment  of  nature, 


xlvi  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

the  use  made  of  light  and  color,  the  melody,  are  all  deter- 
mined by  them  ;  in  studying  the  drama  we  must  remember 
that  it  is  great  not  only  in  parts  but  as  a  whole,  and  that 
each  detail,  however  lovely  in  itself,  gains  wonderfully  from 
its  relation  to  the  emotional  tone  of  the  context. 

The  treatment  of  nature  reveals  Shelley  as  clearly  as  any- 
thing in  the  Prometheus  Unbound.  In  one  sense,  the 
poem  is  a  nature-drama.  The  soul  of  nature  is  herself  one 
of  the  personages  and  the  scenery  is  grand  and  ideal.  In  Act 
I.  we  have  the  wildest  of  mountain  scenery,  bleak  and  bare 
save  for  the  changing  beauty  of  the  sky ;  in  Act  II.  we  find 
ourselves  surrounded  by  the  luxuriance  of  tropical  valleys. 
Sky-cleaving  peaks,  glaciers,  lakes,  rivers,  vast  forests,  meet 
us  on  every  page.  For  the  most  part,  the  action  seems  to 
take  place  on  the  heights,  where  the  air  is  pure  from  taint 
and  earth  most  nearly  attains  to  heaven.  The  sky-scenery 
above  all,  with  its  gloom  of  gathering  storms,  its  radi- 
ant sunrise,  its  "  flocks  of  clouds  in  Spring's  delightful 
weather,"  is  as  great  as  can  be  found  in  English  poetry. 
Here  Shelley's  passion  for  change,  for  fleeting  loveliness, 
can  find  free  scope  indeed.  Yet  perhaps  we  remember  less 
the  bold  outline-work,  the  suggestion  of  nature's  vaster 
aspects,  than  the  rendering  of  marvellously  delicate  detail, 
V>st  on  a  grosser  eye  or  ear :  — 

"  Winged  clouds  soar  here  and  there 
Dark  with  the  rain  new  buds  are  dreaming  of." 

"  As  the  bare  green  hill 

Laughs  with  a  thousand  drops  of  sunny  water 
To  the  unpavilioned  sky." 

"  As  buds  grow  red  when  the  snowstorms  flee."  , 


INTR  OD  UC  TION.  xl  vii 

"  And  like  the  vapours  when  the  sun  sinks  down 
Gathering  again  in  drops  upon  the  pines, 
And  tremulous  as  they,  in  the  deep  night 
My  being  was  condensed." 

Shelley's  imagination  always  plays  upon  exquisitely  accu- 
rate perception,  yet  his  treatment  of  nature  springs,  not 
from  the  dull  observation  of  the  scientist,  but  from  the 
vision-seeing  faculty  of  the  seer.  It  is  a  study  full  of  interest 
to  see  how  often  some  definite  scientific  conception  is  seized 
by  him,  and  vitalized  and  vivified  by  the  dynamic  spiritual- 
izing touch  of  the  imagination.  The  little  biography  of  a 
dew-drop,  Act  IV.  1.  439,  is  a  charming  instance ;  another  is 
found  in  a  passage,  Act  IV.  1.  476,  where  the  force  of  gravi- 
tation is  superbly  interpreted  into  emotional  terms. 

It  is  only  in  the  nineteenth  century  that  the  poets  have 
become  great  colorists,  and  Shelley  is  one  of  the  greatest  that 
the  century  has  seen.  Only  Keats,  perhaps,  can  rival  him ; 
and  if  Keats  has  more  force  of  color,  Shelley  has  more  pur- 
ity. Keats's  coloring  is  opaque,  though  brilliant,  like  that  of 
a  butterfly's  wing ;  Shelley's  is  translucent,  like  an  opal.  Mr. 
Ruskin  tells  us  that  Nature  always  paints  her  loveliest  hues 
on  aqueous  or  crystalline  matter  ;  and  the  very  law  of  Nature 
seems  to  be  the  instinct  of  Shelley.  Rainbow-lights,  keen, 
swift,  and  pure,  play  through  the  Prometheus.  The  color 
flashes  and  is  gone,  elusive  as  that  in  a  dew-drop. 

But  the  color  in  Prometheus  Unbound  has  a  higher 
function  than  to  vivify  the  detail  of  the  poem  or  to  give  us  a 
series  of  exquisite  vignettes.  By  the  use  of  light  and  color 
the  great  drama  is  shaped  into  an  organic  whole,  and  the 
architectonic  power  of  Shelley  is  nobly  shown.  The  harr 
monious  progression  or  evolution  of  the  drama  towards  a 


xlviii  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

definite  goal  is  symbolically  presented  through  the  progress 
of  the  new  cosmic  day.  The  first  act  opens  with  night.  In 
darkness,  lit  by  the  moonbeams  of  Memory  and  Hope,  the 
Titan,  glacier-bound,  hangs 

"  Upon  this  wall  of  eagle-baffling  mountain, 
Black,  wintry,  dead,  unmeasured." 

Slowly  the  "  wingless,  crawling  hours  "  pass  on.  With  the 
approach  of  Mercury  comes  the  first  promise  of  the  dawn, 
that  faint  flush  of  color  in  the  East  which  may  be  seen  hours 
before  sunrise,  gathering  dim  purple  and  solemn  crimson  out 
of  the  very  substance  of  the  darkness  and  the  void.  The 
delusive  promise  is  not  fulfilled.  From  the  East  again  sweeps 
up  the  thunder-cloud  of  the  Furies  :  — 

"  Blackening  the  birth  of  day  with  countless  wings, 
And  hollow  underneath,  like  Death." 

The  storm  covers  the  heavens  with  darkness  which,  deeper 
than  that  of  midnight,  yet  shadows  forth  but  faintly  the 
darkness  of  the  spirit  of  Prometheus.  Flashes  of  lightning 
reveal  the  lurid  visions  of  the  world's  moments  of  keen- 
est pain.  At  last  the  tempest  spends  its  force,  the  clouds 
melt  away,  and  the  "blue  air"  holds  fresh  promise  of  the 
peace  of  dawn.  The  wings  of  the  spirits  of  consolation  fill 
the  air  with  pure  cloud-tints  :  — 

"  See  how  they  float 

On  their  sustaining  wings  of  skyey  grain, 
Orange  and  azure  deepening  into  gold  : 
Their  soft  smiles  fill  the  air  like  a  star's  fire." 

The  exquisite  twilight  of  dawn  enfolds  us ;  and,  with  the 
paling  of  *he  morning  star,  the  act  concludes.  For  the 


INTRODUCTION.  xlix 

deepening  of  the  sunrise  into  its  full  glory,  we  must  turn  to 
the  expectant  heart  of  Love.  The  beginning  of  the  second 
act  gives  us  the  fullest  blaze  of  color  in  the  whole  poem, 
though  the  triumph  of  purest  light  is  to  follow  later.  This 
sunrise-picture  seems  written  in  the  hues  of  the  sky  itself. 
Its  greatest  marvel  lies  in  its  swift  transitions,  the  tremulous 
passage  of  glory  changed  to  glory  even  as  we  behold.  Only 
the  soul  of  a  Turner  could  apprehend  such  a  vision,  and  the 
brush  of  a  Turner  could  but  give  us  one  arrested  instant ; 
while  Shelley  reveals  the  whole  unfolding  wondrous  passage 
of  the  morning  from  promise  to  radiant  fulfilment. 

From  this  point,  the  fresh  light  of  morning  shines  more 
and  more  clearly  through  the  poem.  Once  again  we  feel 
it  with  peculiar  power,  where  Asia  and  Panthea,  breath- 
ing the  pure  air  of  the  heights,  watch  below  their  feet 
the  curling,  brilliant,  sunlit  mists  which  veil  the  abode  of 
Demogorgon. 

Again  for  a  short  space,  we  descend  to  the  region  of 
shadows,  and,  standing  before  the  throne  of  Demogorgon, 

perceive 

"  A  mighty  darkness 

Filling  the  seat  of  power,  and  rays  of  gloom 
Dart  round,  as  light  from  the  meridian  sun." 

Then,  with  abrupt  and  breathless  transition,  we  are  lifted 
to  the  final  Height  of  Vision,  and  to  the  consummation 
of  the  drama.  The  apotheosis  of  Asia  gives  us  the  fulness 
of  white  light,  the  high  noon  of  the  great  cosmic  day. 
Shelley's  mysticism  here  introduces  one  or  two  confusing 
lines ;  but  his  thought  evidently  is  that  the  physical  day  has 
yielded  to  the  new  spiritual  order,  and  that  the  rising  of  the 
material  sun  is  superseded,  at  least  in  this  great  moment,  by 


1  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

the  rising  of  the  sun  of  Love.  The  development  of  the 
theme  of  the  Day  is  now  dropped,  and  the  light  is  seemingly 
constant,  the  implication  perhaps  being  that,  in  the  evolu- 
tion of  human  destiny,  we  have  reached  at  last  the  era  of 
unshadowed  bliss,  which  stoops  not  to  evening. 

The  supreme  aesthetic  glory  of  the  Prometheus  Un- 
bound is  not  its  nature-descriptions  nor  its  color-treatment, 
but  its  music.  Never  did  melody  so  enfold  the  spirit  of  a 
poet.  The  form  is  transparent  and  supple  as  clear  flame. 
Blank  verse  rises  into  the  long,  passionate  swing  of  the 
anapaest,  or  is  broken  by  the  flute-like  notes  of  short  tro- 
chaic lines,  or  relieved  by  the  half-lyrical  effect  of  rhymed 
endings.  The  verse  lends  itself  with  equal  beauty  to  the 
grandeur  of  sustained  endurance,  to  the  passionate  yearn- 
ing of  love,  to  severe  philosophic  inquiry,  to  the  ethereal 
notes  of  spirit-voices  dying  on  the  wind.  The  variety  of 
metres  is  marvellous.  Thirty-six  distinct  verse-forms  are 
to  be  found,  besides  the  blank  verse.  These  forms  are 
usually  simple ;  but  at  times  the  versification-scheme  is 
as  complex  as  that  of  the  most  elaborate  odes  of  Dryden  or 
Collins.  Yet  the  artificial  and  labored  beauty  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century  verse  is  replaced  in  Shelley  by  song  spon- 
taneous as  that  of  his  own  skylark.  The  conventions,  the 
external  barriers  of  poetry,  are  completely  swept  away  by  the 
new  democracy.  We  may  apply  to  Shelley,  and  indeed  to 
the  typical  poet  of  the  modern  world,  the  noble  line  :  — 

"  His  nature  is  its  own  divine  control." 

The  blank  verse  itself  is  no  monotonous  instrument,  and  the 
range  of  the  poet's  power  can  in  no  way  be  better  illustrated 
than  by  the  different  kinds  of  music  which  he  is  able  to  draw 


INTRODUCTION.  \\ 

from  an  instrument  technically  unchanged.  This  may  be 
seen  at  once  by  comparing  the  opening  soliloquy  of  Prome- 
theus, in  Act.  I.,  with  that  of  the  opening  soliloquy  of  Asia 
in  Act  II.  The  music  of  these  two  passages  is  entirely  dif- 
ferent. In  the  speech  of  Prometheus,  consonant  strikes 
hard  on  consonant,  and  the  vowel-coloring  is  scant  and 
cold.  The  lines  have  a  sonorous  pomp,  derived  in  part 
from  their  austere  majesty  of  epithet,  in  part  from  their 
sternly  repressed  passion.  But  into  the  words  of  Asia  has 
passed  something  of  the  soft  air  and  light  of  the  spring-tide 
which  she  sings.  The  melody  has  a  prolonged  and  gentle 
sweetness,  which  might  be  languid,  were  it  not  for  the 
sparkle  of  delicate  life  that  animates  the  whole.  The  same 
distinction  of  quality  may  always  be  felt  in  the  best  utter- 
ances of  Prometheus  and  of  Asia.  Jupiter,  again,  speaks 
with  a  proud  accent  all  his  own.  His  monologue  has  a  cer- 
tain metallic  ring,  a  harshness  of  utterance,  quite  different 
from  the  pure,  quiet,  sad,  and  strong  accent  of  Prometheus. 
To  Demogorgon's  speeches  Shelley  has  not,  I  think,  suc- 
ceeded in  imparting  a  distinct  cadence.  He  says  little,  and 
his  few  speeches  are  commonplace  as  poetry,  though  at  times 
suggestive  as  thought.  Any  poet  of  the  third  order  could 
have  written  :  — 

"  Lift  thy  lightnings  not. 

The  tyranny  of  heaven  none  may  retain 

Or  reassume  or  hold,  succeeding  thee." 

Probably  even  Shelley  found  it  difficult  to  impart  individual 
accent  to  the  words  of  a  "  Mighty  Darkness." 

Of  all  these  different  types  of  blank  verse,  there  is  one 
most  intimately  characteristic  of  Shelley.    We  find  it  always . 
in  the  speeches  of  Asia,  sometimes  elsewhere.     Miltonic 


Hi  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

echoes  sound  through  the  words  of  Prometheus  and  of 
Jupiter,  but  there  is  a  cadence  of  which  Shelley  alone  is 
master,  unique  in  haunting,  clinging  melody. 

"  Shepherded  by  the  slow,  unwilling  wind." 
"  With  feet  unwet,  unwearied,  undelaying." 
"  It  is  the  unpastured  sea  hungering  for  calm." 

"  See  where  the  child  of  heaven,  with  winged  feet 
Runs  down  the  slanted  sunlight  of  the  dawn." 

In  lines  like  these,  Shelley  has  drawn  a  new  music  from 
English  words. 

Even  the  blank  verse  of  Shelley  holds  a  subtle  lyrical  cry ; 
but  it  is  the  sweep  and  variety  of  direct  lyrical  modulation 
which  first  arrests  attention  in  the  Prometheus  Unbound. 
There  is  no  rigid  distinction  in  the  use  of  metre,  yet  the 
major  characters  of  the  drama  use  as  a  rule  the  plain 
recitative,  while  lone,  Panthea,  and  the  other  chorus-char- 
acters generally  sing  rather  than  speak.  These  chorus- 
characters,  or  rather  chorus-voices,  enhance  wonderfully  the 
imaginative  power  of  the  drama.  Coming  from  an  unseen 
source,  they  make  themselves  heard  again  and  again  at 
critical  moments.  The  whole  creation,  visible  and  invisible, 
seems  thus  to  share  in  the  great  spiritual  action  of  the  poem ; 
and  the  unearthly  beauty  of  these  snatches  of  song  thrills 
us  with  the  sense  that  we  are  listening  to  elemental  crea- 
tures, too  fine  for  discernment  by  any  grosser  sense  than  that 
of  sound.  These  spirit-voices  are  first  heard  in  Act  I.,  where 
the  Earth-mother,  yet  unenlightened,  bemoans  Prometheus's 
retraction  of  the  curse  :  — 


INTRODUCTION.  Hii 

"  Misery,  oh  misery  to  me 
That  Jove  at  last  should  vanquish  ye. 
Wail,  howl  aloud,  land  and  sea. 
The  earth's  rent  heart  shall  answer  ye. 
Mourn,  spirits  of  the  living  and  the  dead, 
Your  refuge,  your  defence,  lies  fallen  and  vanquished." 

FIRST  ECHO. 
Lies  fallen,  and  vanquished. 

SECOND  ECHO. 

Fallen  and  vanquished. 

Thus  we  have  the  impression  of  the  Powers  of  Nature, 
.ethereal  yet  unspiritual,  unable  to  apprehend  the  higher  atti- 
tude of  regenerate  man.  But  the  most  exquisite  instance 
of  this  fairy-like  use  of  the  lyrical  interlude  is  in  that  first 
scene  of  the  second  act,  already  quoted,  where  all  nature, 
becoming  vocal  with  spirit-voices,  sings  and  whispers  its 
quickening  message.  These  tiny  lyrics  can  be  compared  to 
nothing  but  the  Ariel  songs  in  the  Tempest.  They  have 
the  same  light  trochaic  movement,  sacred,  in  Shakespeare 
and  Shelley,  to  fairy  suggestion  ;  they  have  the  same  dainty 
and  elusive  grace.  Perhaps  the  singing  of  the  wind  in  the 
pine  branches  and  the  lovely,  inarticulate  rise  and  fall  of  the 
sounds  of  nature  in  a  spring  morning  ring  through  the  songs 
of  Shelley's  echoes  even  more  perfectly  than  through  those 
of  Shakespeare's  tricksy  sprite.  In  the  last  act  of  the  Pro- 
metheus the  spirit-voices  have  it  all  their  own  way.  Their 
music,  from  an  undertone,  has  become  dominant,  and  they 
blend  with  a  grander  harmony  in  expressing  the  rapture*  of 
a  creation  redeemed  to  the  freedom  of  new  and  perfect 
life. 


liv  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

Shelley's  handling  of  his  instrument  will  become  clearer 
if  we  follow  very  briefly  the  consecutive  metrical  changes  in 
the  drama.  As  a  rule,  the  blank  verse  marks  passages  of 
transition  or  of  repressed  feeling,  while  at  every  climax  of 
passion  the  poetry  rushes  into  lyrical  form.  The  first  intro- 
duction of  the  lyric  follows  the  opening  soliloquy  of  Pro- 
metheus. He  calls  on  mountains,  springs,  the  air,  the 
whirlwinds,  to  repeat  to  him  the  forgotten  curse.  They 
respond,  and  deny,  in  long  lyrical  lines ;  and,  though  the 
horror  deepens  through  the  images  of  carnage  presented  by 
their  words,  relief  is  yet  afforded,  after  the  stern  repression 
of  Prometheus,  by  the  free  beauty  of  the  movement  of  the 
verse.  The  lyric  next  appears  where  lone  and  Panthea,. 
whose  voices  are  now  heard  for  the  first  time,  hail  the 
approach  of  the  Phantasm  of  Jupiter.  This  is  the  first  pas- 
sage in  the  drama  of  pure  and  painless  beauty.  The  curse 
is  lyrical,  but  even,  slow,  serene  in  movement.  The  com- 
ing of  Mercury  is  sung  by  the  sister-spirits  in  exquisite 
lines.  After  the  long  passage,  in  which  the  Titan,  clad  in 
the  conscious  pride  of  purity,  repels  the  temptation  of  the 
fair  Spirit  of  Compromise,  the  lyric  appears  again  with 
the  coming  of  the  Furies.  We  approach  now  the  climax 
of  the  horror  of  the  drama.  That  horror  is  rendered  en- 
durable, and  competent  to  purge  us  by  pity  and  terror, 
largely  through  the  marvellous  beauty  of  the  music  through 
which  it  breathes.  As  the  pain  of  the  whole  world  presses 
upon  the  spirit  of  Prometheus,  the  music  deepens  in  gran- 
deur and  solemnity ; .  the  grievous  terror  of  the  visions 
beheld  by  the  Titan  is  subdued  by  the  weird  melody  that 
ebbs  and  flows  with  the  theme.  Yet  not  in  lyric  but  in 
blank  verse  is  reached  the  climax  of  the  revelation  of  sor- 


INTRODUCTION.  lv 

row,  and  in  blank  verse  does  Prometheus  utter  his  cry 
of  supreme  anguish.  Shelley  doubtless  here  suggests  the 
quietness  of  the  deepest  horror  of  life.  Not  the  height 
of  lyrical  passion  but  dull  recognition  of  daily  experience 
marks  the  supreme  bitterness  of  the  woful  problem  of  hu- 
man destiny.  As  the  pain  subsides  and  the  weary  but  tri- 
umphant Titan  sinks  into  repose,  the  tension  of  the  song 
relaxes.  The  coming  of  the  spirits  of  the  human  mind  is 
heralded  in  lines  which  afford  exquisite  relief  by  the  mere 
introduction  of  rhyme  ;  and  the  lyrics  of  consolation  chanted 
by  these  spirits  have  a  serene  and  tender  beauty  of  move- 
ment all  their  own. 

Of  certain  portions  of  the  music  of  the  second  act  we 
have  already  spoken.  "  Shelley  has  here,"  says  Todhunter, 
"  made  English  blank  verse  the  native  language  of  elemental 
genii."  The  lyrics  are  more  frequent,  and  blend  more  with 
structure  than  in  the  first  act.  The  whole  journey  of  Asia 
and  Panthea  is  like  a  great  processional,  accompanied  by  a 
chant  which  now  rises,  now  falls  upon  the  wind.  The  semi- 
choruses  that  sing  the  advance  of  the  sister-spirits  have  a  sub- 
tle mystical  meaning ;  they  have  also  an  imaginative  beauty 
of  movement  like  that  of  Keats's  Ode  to  a  Nightingale, 
but  with  less  heavy  richness,  and  a  more  flute-like  tone. 

The  longest  passage  of  blank  verse  in  the  act  is  the  discus- 
sion between  Demogorgon  and  Asia,  which  is  purely  intel- 
lectual. As  soon  as  emotion  and  action  reappear,  the  verse 
breaks  into  the  Song  of  the  Spirit  of  the  Hour.  This  ana- 
paestic lyric,  interrupted  as  it  is  by  the  end  of  the  scene,  £ud 
ended  in  Scene  V.,  gives  a  wonderful  impression  of  haste. 
The  fifth  scene,  the  apotheosis  of  Asia,  touches  the  high- 
water  mark  of  the  English  lyric.  The  scene  corresponds  in 


Ivi  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

passion  to  the  scene  with  the  Furies,  in  Act  I.  As  that  was 
hate  this  is  love,  as  that  was  darkness  this  is  light,  as  that  was 
supreme  horror  so  this  is  supreme  rapture.  The  great  Lyric, 
Life  of  Life,  is  simple  in  form,  as  a  ray  of  white  sunlight 
is  simple.  Asia's  response,  less  well  known,  is  a  sequence 
of  subtly  inwoven  harmonies. 

The  third  act,  as  we  have  already  said,  is  attuned  to  the 
music  of  peace.  But  Shelley  is  less  fitted  to  render  this 
music  than  to  sing  of  desire,  or  even  of  endurance.  The 
second  act  is  artistically  as  well  as  spiritually  the  finest  in 
the  drama.  Yet  the  third  act  has  certain  passages  of  tran- 
quil music,  music  no  longer,  as  in  the  first  act,  breathing  the 
tense  calm  of  pain  and  scorn,  but  inspired  with  the  free 
serenity  of  joy.  Such  is  the  lovely  little  scene  between  Apollo 
and  Ocean,  which  is  Hellenic  in  its  pure  repose. 

The  fourth  act  defies  comment.  The  triumphant  paean 
of  enfranchised  Nature,  it  is  so  bewildering  in  complex 
structure,  so  intricate  in  beauty,  so  remote  from  all  human 
interest,  that  complete  sympathy  with  it  is,  perhaps,  im- 
possible. Yet  the  act  as  a  whole  marks  the  most  sustained 
effort  of  English  lyrical  genius.  The  music  with  which  it 
opens  is  light,  almost  too  light,  perhaps,  as  the  Hours,  past 
and  future,  and  the  spirits  of  the  human  mind,  join  in  joyful 
choruses  of  thankful  glee.  But  soon  the  music  deepens  and 
widens,  and  proceeds  with  an  involution  of  solemn  harmony, 
in  the  grand  antiphon  of  rejoicing  between  the  Spirit  of  the 
Earth  and  of  the  Moon.  The  music  of  the  earth  is  grave 
and  exultant,  that  of  the  moon  exquisite  in  lightness  and 
tenderness.  The  act,  and  the  drama,  conclude  with  an 
organ-roll  of  harmony,  like  that  of  the  Ode  to  the  West 
Wind.,  Pemogorgon,  the  mystic  Living  Spirit,  the  Power 


INTRODUCTION.  Ivii 

no  longer  of  Destruction  but  of  Love,  solemnly  invokes  all 
forces  of  natural  and  spiritual  life  to  listen  to  his  song ;  and 
when,  in  answering  music,  they  attest  their  presence,  and  we 
feel  the  harmony  of  the  redeemed  creation  speaking  through 
their  words,  he  utters,  in  cadence  grave  and  serene,  his  final 
message.  It  is  the  message  of  courage  and  of  hope ;  and 
the  quiet  dignity  and  seriousness  of  the  lines  fitly  conclude 
that  music  which  may  at  times  have  seemed  wild,  lawless, 
and  fantastic,  yet  which  has  always  in  its  most  passionate 
abandon  yielded  allegiance  to  the  law  of  perfect  beauty. 

Thus  we  see  that  the  poetic  power  of  Shelley,  as  mani- 
fested in  the  Prometheus  Unbound,  is  distinct  and  very 
high.  The  hold  on  concrete  human  life  of  a  Shakespeare 
or  a  Browning  he  does  not  possess  ;  nor  was  there  granted 
to  him  the  serene  insight  of  Wordsworth  nor  the  philosophic 
method  of  Tennyson.  But  his  exquisitely  equipped  temper- 
ament, sensitive  in  every  fibre,  enabled  him  to  express  those 
finest  aspects  of  nature  where  visible  trembles  into  invisible, 
and  those  finest  aspects  of  emotion  where  rapture  and  sor- 
row blend.  He  has  the  power  to  sing  melodies  which  seem 
the  echoes  of  unearthly  music,  while  his  imaginative  passion 
and  spiritual  insight  reveal  to  him  the  solemn  vision  of 
human  destiny,  and  the  redemption  that  shall  be.  The 
Ode  to  the  West  Wind,  written  in  the  same  year  as  the 
Prometheus  Unbound,  doubtless  expresses  Shelley's  own 
longing  for  his  drama;  and  as  we  realize  the  power  with 
which  his  message  has  been  uttered,  we  must  feel  that  the. 
longing  has  been  fulfilled  :  — 

"  Make  me  thy  lyre,  even  as  the  forest  is. 
What  though  my  leaves  are  falling  like  its  own? 
The  tumult  of  thy  mighty  harmonies 


Iviii  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

u  Shall  take  from  both  a  deep  Autumnal  tone, 
Sweet,  though  in  sadness;  be  thou,  Spirit  fierce, 
My  Spirit;  be  thou  me,  impetuous  one. 

"  Drive  my  dead  thoughts  over  the  universe 

Like  withered  leaves,  to  quicken  a  new  birth, 
;       And  by  the  incantation  of  this  verse 

"  Scatter,  as  from  an  unextinguished  hearth, 
Ashes  and  sparks,  my  words  among  mankind; 
Be  through  my  lips  to  unawakened  earth 

"The  trumpet  of  a  prophecy.     O  wind, 
If  Winter  come,  can  Spring  be  far  behind?" 


PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND 

A   LYRICAL   DRAMA 

IN  FOUR  ACTS 

BY 

PERCY   BYSSHE   SHELLEY 

"Audisne  hac  Amphiarae,  sub  terram  abditc?"  \ 


PREFACE. 

[By  SHELLEY.] 

THE  Greek  tragic  writers,  in  selecting  as  their  subject  any  portion 
of  their  national  history  or  mythology,  employed  in  their  treatment  of 
it  a  certain  arbitrary  discretion.  They  by  no  means  conceived  them- 
selves bound  to  adhere  to  the  common  interpretation  or  to  imitate  in 
story  as  in  title  their  rivals  and  predecessors.  Such  a  system  would 
have  amounted  to  a  resignation  of  those  claims  to  preference  over  their 
competitors  which  incited  the  composition.  The  Agamemnonian  story 
was  exhibited  on  the  Athenian  theatre  with  as  many  variations  as 
dramas. 

I  have  presumed  to  employ  a  similar  licence.  The  Prometheus 
Unbound  of  ^Eschylus  supposed  the  reconciliation  of  Jupiter  with  his 
victim  as  the  price  of  the  disclosure  of  the  danger  threatened  to  his 
empire  by  the  consummation  of  his  marriage  with  Thetis.  Thetis,  ac- 
cording to  this  view  of  the  subject,  was  given  in  marriage  to  Peleus,  and 
Prometheus,  by  the  permission  of  Jupiter,  delivered  from  his  captivity 
by  Hercules.  Had  I  framed  my  story  on  this  model,  I  should  have 
done  no  more  than  have  attempted  to  restore  the  lost  drama  of  y£schy- 
lus;  an  ambition,  which,  if  my  preference  to  this  mode  of  tf eating  the 
subject  had  incited  me  to  cherish,  the  recollection  of  the  high  com- 
parison such  an  attempt  would  challenge  might  well  abate.  But,  in 
truth,  I  was  averse  from  a  catastrophe  so  feeble  as  that  of  reconciling 
the  Champion  with  the  Oppressor  of  mankind.  The  moral  interest  of 
the  fable,  which  is  so  powerfully  sustained  by  the  sufferings  and  endur- 
ance of  Prometheus,  would  be  annihilated  if  we  could  conceive  of  him 
as  unsaying  his  high  language  and  quailing  before  his  successful  and 
perfidious  adversary.  The  only  imaginary  being  resembling  in  any 
degree  Prometheus,  is  Satan ;  and  Prometheus  is,  in  my  judgement,  a 
more  poetical  character  than  Satan,  because,  in  addition  to  courage, 

3 


4  PREFACE. 

and  majesty,  and  firm  and  patient  opposition  to  omnipotent  force,  he  is 
susceptible  of  being  described  as  exempt  from  the  taints  of  ambition, 
envy,  revenge,  and  a  desire  for  personal  aggrandisement,  which,  in  the 
Hero  of  Paradise  Lost,  interfere  with  the  interest.  The  character  of 
Satan  engenders  in  the  mind  a  pernicious  casuistry  which  leads  us  to 
weigh  his  faults  and  his  wrongs,  and  to  excuse  the  former  because  the 
latter  exceed  all  measure.  In  the  minds  of  those  who  consider  that 
magnificent  fiction  with  a  religious  feeling  it  engenders  something 
worse.  But  Prometheus  is,  as  it  were,  the  type  of  the  highest  perfec- 
tion of  moral  and  intellectual  nature,  impelled  by  the  purest  and  the 
truest  motives  to  the  best  and  noblest  ends.  • 

This  Poem  was  chiefly  written  upon  the  mountainous  ruins  of  the 
Baths  of  Caracalla,  among  the  flowery  glades,  and  thickets  of  odor- 
iferous blossoming  trees,  which  are  extended  in  ever  winding  labyrinths 
upon  its  immense  platforms  and  dizzy  arches  suspended  in  the  air. 
The  bright  blue  sky  of  Rome,  and  the  effect  of  the  vigorous  awakening 
spring  in  that  divinest  climate,  and  the  new  life  with  which  it  drenches 
the  spirits  even  to  intoxication,  were  the  inspiration  of  this  drama. 

The  imagery  which  I  have  employed  will  be  found,  in  many  in- 
stances, to  have  been  drawn  from  the  operations  of  the  human  mind, 
or  from  those  external  actions  by  which  they  are  expressed.  This  is 
unusual  in  modern  poetry,  although  Dante  and  Shakspeare  are  full  of 
instances  of  the  same  kind  :  Dante  indeed  more  than  any  other  poet, 
and  with  greater  success.  But  the  Greek  poets,  as  writers  to  whom  no 
resource  of  awakening  the  sympathy  of  their  contemporaries  was  un- 
known, were  in  the  habitual  use  of  this  power;  and  it  is  the  study  of 
their  works,  (since  a  higher  merit  would  probably  be  denied  me,)  to 
which  I  am  willing  that  my  readers  should  impute  this  singularity. 

One  word  is  due  in  candour  to  the  degree  in  which  the  study  of 
contemporary  writings  may  have  tinged  my  composition;  for  such  has 
been  a  topic  of  censure  with  regard  to  poems  far  more  popular,  and 
indeed  more  deservedly  popular,  than  mine.  It  is  impossible  that  any 
one  who  inhabits  the  same  age  with  such  writers  as  those  who  stand  in 
the  foremost  ranks  of  our  own,  can  conscientiously  assure  himself  that 
his  language  and  tone  of  thought  may  not  have  been  modified  by  the 
study  of  the  productions  of  those  extraordinary  intellects.  It  is  true, 
that,  not  the  spirit  of  their  genius,  but  the  forms  in  which  it  has  mani- 


PREFACE.  5 

fested  itself,  are  due  less  to  the  peculiarities  of  their  own  minds  than 
to  the  peculiarity  of  the  moral  and  the  intellectual  condition  of  the 
minds  among  which  they  have  been  produced.  Thus  a  number  of 
writers  possess  the  form,  whilst  they  want  the  spirit  of  those  whom,  it 
is  alleged,  they  imitate;  because  the  former  is  the  endowment  of  the 
age  in  which  they  live,  and  the  latter  must  be  the  uncommunicated 
lightning  of  their  own  mind. 

The  peculiar  style  of  intense  and  comprehensive  imagery  which  dis- 
tinguishes the  modern  literature  of  England,  has  not  been,  as  a  general 
power,  the  product  of  the  imitation  of  any  particular  writer.  The  mass 
of  capabilities  remains  at  every  period  materially  the  same ;  the  cir- 
cumstances which  awaken  it  to  action  perpetually  change.  If  England 
were  divided  into  forty  republics,  each  equal  in  population  and  extent 
to  Athens,  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose  but  that,  under  institutions 
not  more  perfect  than  those  of  Athens,  each  would  produce  philoso- 
phers and  poets  equal  to  those  who  (if  we  except  Shakspeare)  have 
never  been  surpassed.  We  owe  the  great  writers  of  the  golden  age 
of  our  literature  to  that  fervid  awakening  of  the  public  mind  which 
shook  to  dust  the  oldest  and  most  oppressive  form  of  the  Christian 
religion.  We  owe  Milton  to  the  progress  and  developement  of  the  same 
spirit :  the  sacred  Milton  was,  let  it  ever  be  remembered,  a  republican, 
and  a  bold  inquirer  into  morals  and  religion.  The  great  writers  of  our 
own  age  are,  we  have  reason  to  suppose,  the  companions  and  forerunners 
of  some  unimagined  change  in  our  social  condition  or  the  opinions 
which  cement  it.  The  cloud  of  mind  is  discharging  its  collected  light- 
ning, and  the  equilibrium  between  institutions  and  opinions  is  now 
restoring,  or  is  about  to  be  restored. 

As  to  imitation,  poetry  is  a  mimetic  art.  It  creates,  but  it  creates 
by  combination  and  representation.  Poetical  abstractions  are  beauti- 
ful and  new,  not  because  the  portions  of  which  they  are  composed  had 
no  previous  existence  in  the  mind  of  man  or  in  nature,  but  because  the 
whole  produced  by  their  combination  has  some  intelligible  and  beauti- 
ful analogy  with  those  sources  of  emotion  and  thought,  and  with  the 
contemporary  condition  of  them :  one  great  poet  is  a  masterpiece  of 
nature  which  another  not  only  ought  to  study  but  must  study.  He 
might  as  wisely  and  as  easily  determine  that  his  mind  should  no  longer 
be  the  mirror  of  all  that  is  lovely  in  the  visible  universe,  as  exclude 


6  PREFACE. 

from  his  contemplation  the  beautiful  which  exists  in  the  writings  of  a 
great  contemporary.  The  pretence  of  doing  it  would  be  a  presumption 
in  any  but  the  greatest;  the  effect,  even  in  him,  would  be  strained, 
unnatural,  and  ineffectual.  A  poet  is  the  combined  product  of  such 
internal  powers  as  modify  the  nature  of  others;  and  of  such  external 
influences  as  excite  and  sustain  these  powers;  he  is  not  one,  but  both. 
Every  man's  mind  is,  in  this  respect,  modified  by  all  the  objects  of  Nature 
and  art;  by  every  word  and  every  suggestion  which  he  ever  admitted 
to  act  upon  his  consciousness;  it  is  the  mirror  upon  which  all  forms 
are  reflected,  and  in  which  they  compose  one  form.  Poets,  not  other- 
wise than  philosophers,  painters,  sculptors,  and  musicians,  are,  in  one 
sense,  the  creators,  and,  in  another,  the  creations,  of  their  age.  From 
this  subjection  the  loftiest  do  not  escape.  There  is  a  similarity  between 
Homer  and  Hesiod,  between  ^Eschylus  and  Euripides,  between  Virgil 
and  Horace,  between  Dante  and  Petrarch,  between  Shakspeare  and 
Fletcher,  between  Dryden  and  Pope;  each  has  a  generic  resemblance 
under  which  their  specific  distinctions  are  arranged.  If  this  similarity 
be  the  result  of  imitation,  I  am  willing  to  confess  that  I  have  imitated. 
Let  this  opportunity  be  conceded  to  me  of  acknowledging  that  I 
have,  what  a  Scotch  philosopher  characteristically  terms,  "  a  passion 
for  reforming  the  world :  "  what  passion  incited  him  to  write  and  pub- 
lish his  book,  he  omits  to  explain.  For  my  part  I  would  rather  be 
damned  with  Plato  and  Lord  Bacon,  than  go  to  Heaven  with  Paley 
and  Malthus.  But  it  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  I  dedicate  my  poeti- 
cal compositions  solely  to  the  direct  enforcement  of  reform,  or  that  I 
consider  them  in  any  degree  as  containing  a  reasoned  system  on  the 
theory  of  human  life.  Didactic  poetry  is  my  abhorrence;  nothing  can 
be  equally  well  expressed  in  prose  that  is  not  tedious  and  supereroga- 
tory in  verse.  My  purpose  has  hitherto  been  simply  to  familiarize  the 
highly  refined  imagination  of  the  more  select  classes  of  poetical  readers 
with  beautiful  idealisms  of  moral  excellence;  aware  that  until  the  mind 
can  love,  and  admire,  and  trust,  and  hope,  and  endure,  reasoned  princi- 
ples of  moral  conduct  are  seeds  cast  upon  the  highway  of  life  which 
the  unconscious  passenger  tramples  into  dust,  although  they  would 
bear  the  harvest  of  his  happiness.  Should  I  live  to  accomplish  what  I 
purpose,  that  is,  produce  a  systematical  history  of  what  appear  to  me 
to  be  the  genuine  elements  of  human  society,  let  not  the  advocates  of 


PREFACE. 

injustice  and  superstition  flatter  themselves  that  I  should  take 
lus  rather  than  Plato  as  my  model. 

The  having  spoken  of  myself  with  unaffected  freedom  will  need  little 
apology  with  the  candid;  and  let  the  uncandid  consider  that  they 
injure  me  less  than  their  own  hearts  and  minds  by  misrepresentation. 
Whatever  talents  a  person  may  possess  to  amuse  and  instruct  others,  be 
they  ever  so  inconsiderable,  he  is  yet  bound  to  exert  them :  if  his 
attempt  be  ineffectual,  let  the  punishment  of  an  unaccomplished  pur- 
pose have  been  sufficient;  let  none  trouble  themselves  to  heap  the  dust 
of  oblivion  upon  his  efforts;  the  pile  they  raise  will  betray  his  grave 
which  might  otherwise  have  been  unknown. 


PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 


DRAMATIS  PERSONS. 


PROMETHEUS. 

DEMOGORGON. 

JUPITER. 

THE  EARTH. 

OCEAN. 

APOLLO, 

MERCURY. 

HERCULES. 


ASIA,  i 

PANTHEA,      >•  Oceanides. 
IONE,  J 

THE  PHANTASM  OF  JUPITER. 
THE  SPIRIT  OF  THE  EARTH. 
THE  SPIRIT  OF  THE  MOON. 
SPIRITS  OF  THE  HOURS. 
SPIRITS.     ECHOES.     FAUNS. 
FURIES. 


SCENE,  A  Ravine  of  Icy  Rocks  in  the  Indian  Caucasus. 
PROMETHEUS  is  discovered  bound  to  the  Precipice.  PAN- 
THEA and  IONE  are  seated  at  his  Feet.  Time,  Night. 
During  the  Scene,  Morning  slowly  breaks. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Monarch  of  Gods  and  Daemons,  and  all  Spirits  ^ 

But  One,  who  throng  those  bright  and  rolling  worlds 
Which  Thou  and  I  alone  of  living  things 
Behold  with  sleepless  eyes  !  regard  this  Earth 


10  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

Made  multitudinous  with  thy  slaves,  whom  thou 

Requitest  for  knee-worship,  prayer,  and  praise, 

And  toil,  and  hecatombs  of  broken  hearts, 

With  fear  and  self-contempt  and  barren  hope. 

Whilst  me,  who  am  thy  foe,  eyeless  in  hate, 

Hast  thou  made  reign  and  triumph,  to  thy  scorn,  10 

O'er  mine  own  misery  and  thy  vain  revenge. 

Three  thousand  years  of  sleep-unsheltered  hours, 

And  moments  aye  divided  by  keen  pangs 

Till  they  seemed  years,  torture  and  solitude, 

Scorn  and  despair,  —  these  are  mine  empire. 

More  glorious  far  than  that  which  thou  surveyest 

From  thine  unenvied  throne,  O,  Mighty  God  ! 

Almighty,  had  I  deigned  to  share  the  shame 

Of  thine  ill  tyranny,  and  hung  not  here 

Nailed  to  this  wall  of  eagle-baffling  mountain,  20 

Black,  wintry,  dead,  unmeasured ;  without  herb, 

Insect,  or  beast,  or  shape  or  sound  of  life. 

Ah  me  !  alas,  pain,  pain  ever,  for  ever  ! 

No  change,  no  pause,  no  hope  !    Yet  I  endure. 

I  ask  the  Earth,  have  not  the  mountains  felt? 

I  ask  yon  Heaven,  the  all-beholding  Sun, 

Has  it  not  seen  ?    The  Sea,  in  storm  or  calm, 

Heaven's  ever-changing  shadow  spread  below, 

Have  its  deaf  waves  not  heard  my  agony? 

Ah  me  !  alas,  pain,  pain  ever,  for  ever  !  30 

The  crawling  glaciers  pierce  me  with  the  spears 
Of  their  moon-freezing  crystals,  the  bright  chains 
Eat  with  their  burning  cold  into  my  bones. 
Heaven's  winged  hound,  polluting  from  thy  lips 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  11 

I 

His  beak  in  poison  not  his  own,  tears  up 

My  heart ;  and  shapeless  sights  come  wandering  by, 

The  ghastly  people  of  the  realm  of  dream, 

Mocking  me  :  and  the  Earthquake- fiends  are  charged 

To  wrench  the  rivets  from  my  quivering  wounds 

When  the  rocks  split  and  close  again  behind :  40 

While  from  their  loud  abysses  howling  throng 

The  genii  of  the  storm,  urging  the  rage 

Of  whirlwind,  and  afflict  me  with  keen  hail 

And  yet  to  me  welcome  is  day  and  night, 

Whether  one  breaks  the  hoar  frost  of  the  morn, 

Or,  starry,  dim,  and  slow,  the  other  climbs 

The  leaden-colored  east ;  for  then  they  lead 

The  wingless,  crawling  hours,  one  among  whom 

—  As  some  dark  Priest  hales  the  reluctant  victim  — 

Shall  drag  thee,  cruel  King,  to  kiss  the  blood  50 

From  these  pale  feet,  which  then  might  trample  thee 

If  they  disdained  not  such  a  prostrate  slave. 

Disdain  !    Ah  no  !  I  pity  thee.    What  ruin 

Will  hunt  thee  undefended  thro'  the  wide  Heaven  ! 

How  will  thy  soul,  cloven  to  its  depth  with  terror, 

Gape  like  a  heft  within  !     I  speak  in  grief, 

Not  exultation,  for  I  hate  no  more, 

As  then  ere  misery  made  me  wise.     The  curse 

Once  breathed  on  thee  I  would  recall.     Ye  Mountains, 

Whose  many-voiced  Echoes,  thro'  the  mist  60 

Of  cataracts,  flung  the  thunder  of  that  spell ! 

Ye  icy  Springs,  stagnant  with  wrinkling  frost, 

Which  vibrated  to  hear  me,  and  then  crept 

Shuddering  thro'  India  !    Thou  serenest  Air, 

Thro'  which  the  Sun  walks  burning  without  beams  ! 


12  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  I. 

And  ye  swift  Whirlwinds,  who  on  poised  wings 

Hung  mute  and  moveless  o'er  yon  hushed  abyss, 

As  thunder,  louder  than  your  own,  made  rock 

The  orbed  world  !    If  then  my  words  had  power, 

Though  I  am  changed  so  that  aught  evil  wish  70 

Is  dead  within ;  although  no  memory  be 

Of  what  is  hate,  let  them  not  lose  it  now  ! 

What  was  that  curse  ?  for  ye  all  heard  me  speak. 

FIRST  VOICE  :    from  the  Mountains. 

Thrice  three  hundred  thousand  years 
O'er  the  Earthquake's  couch  we  stood : 

Oft,  as  men  convulsed  with  fears, 
We  trembled  in  our  multitude. 

SECOND   VOICE  :    from  the  Springs. 

Thunder-bolts  had  parched  our  water, 
We  had  been  stained  with  bitter  blood, 

And  had  run  mute,  'mid  shrieks  of  slaughter,          80 
Thro'  a  city  and  a  solitude. 

• 
•  THIRD  VOICE  :  from  the  Air. 

I  had  clothed,  since  Earth  uprose, 

Its  wastes  in  colours  not  their  own, 
And  oft  had  my  serene  repose 

Been  cloven  by  many  a  rending  groan. 

FOURTH  VOICE  :    from  the  Whirlwinds, 

We  had  soared  beneath  these  mountains 
Unresting  ages ;  nor  had  thunder, 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  13 

Nor  yon  volcano's  flaming  fountains, 
Nor  any  power  above  or  under 
Ever  made  us  mute  with  wonder.  90 

FIRST  VOICE. 

But  never  bowed  our  snowy  crest 
As  at  the  voice  of  thine  unrest. 

SECOND  VOICE. 

Never  such  a  sound  before 
To  the  Indian  waves  we  bore. 
A  pilot  asleep  on  the  howling  sea 
Leaped  up  from  the  deck  in  agony, 
And  heard,  and  cried,  "  Ah,  woe  is  me  !  " 
And  died  as  mad  as  the  wild  waves  be. 

THIRD  VOICE. 

By  such  dread  words  from  Earth  to  Heaven 
My  still  realm  was  never  riven :  100 

When  its  wound  was  closed,  there  stood 
Darkness  o'er  the  day  like  blood. 

ff 

FOURTH  VOICE. 

And  we  shrank  back  :  for  dreams  of  ruin 
To  frozen  caves  our  flight  pursuing 
Made  us  keep  silence  —  thus  —  and  thus  — 
Though  silence  is  a  hell  to  us. 

THE  EARTH. 

The  tongueless  Caverns  of  the  craggy  hills 

Cried,  '  Misery  ! '  then ;  the  hollow  Heaven  replied 


14  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  I. 

'  Misery  ! '     And  the  Ocean's  purple  waves, 

Climbing  the  land,  howled  to  the  lashing  winds,  no 

And  the  pale  nations  heard  it,  '  Misery  ! ' 

PROMETHEUS. 

I  heard  a  sound  of  voices  :  not  the  voice 

Which  I  gave  forth.     Mother,  thy  sons  and  thou 

Scorn  him,  without  whose  all- enduring  will 

Beneath  the  fierce  omnipotence  of  Jove, 

Both  they  and  thou  had  vanished,  like  thin  mist 

Unrolled  on  the  morning  wind.     Know  ye  not  me, 

The  Titan  ?     He  who  made  his  agony 

The  barrier  to  your  else  all-conquering  foe  ? 

Oh  rock-embosomed  lawns,  and  snow-fed  streams,  120 

Now  seen  athwart  frore  vapours,  deep  below, 

Thro'  whose  o'ershadowing  woods  I  wandered  once 

With  Asia,  drinking  life  from  her  loved  eyes ; 

Why  scorns  the  spirit  which  informs  ye,  now 

To  commune  with  me  ?  me  alone,  who  checked, 

As  one  who  checks  a  fiend-drawn  charioteer, 

The  falsehood  and  the  force  of  him  who  reigns 

Supreme,  and  with  the  groans  of  pining  slaves 

Fills  your  dim  glens  and  liquid  wildernesses  : 

Why  answer  ye  not,  still  ?  Brethren  ! 

THE  EARTH. 

They  dare  not.       130 

PROMETHEUS. 

Who  dares  ?  for  I  would  hear  that  curse  again. 
Ha,  what  an  awful  whisper  rises  up  ! 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  15 

Tis  scarce  like  sound  :  it  tingles  thro'  the  frame 
As  lightning*  tingles,  hovering  ere  it  strike. 
Speak,  Spirit !     From  thine  inorganic  voice 
I  only  know  that  thou  art  moving  near 
And  love.     How  cursed  I  him  ? 

THE  EARTH. 

How  canst  thou  hear 
Who  knowest  not  the  language  of  the  dead  ? 

PROMETHEUS. 
Thou  art  a  living  spirit :  speak  as  they. 

THE  EARTH. 

I  dare  not  speak  like  life,  lest  Heaven's  fell  King  140 

Should  hear,  and  link  me  to  some  wheel  of  pain 

More  torturing  than  the  one  whereon  I  roll. 

Subtle  thou  art  and  good,  and  tho'  the  Gods 

Hear  not  this  voice,  yet  thou  art  more  than  God, 

Being  wise  and  kind :  earnestly  hearken  now. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Obscurely  thro'  my  brain,  like  shadows  dim, 
Sweep  awful  thoughts,  rapid  and  thick.     I  feel 
Faint,  like  one  mingled  in  entwining  love ; 
Yet  'tis  not  pleasure. 

THE  EARTH. 

No,  thou  canst  not  hear : 

Thou  art  immortal,  and  this  tongue  is  known  150 

**w 
Only  to  those  who  die. 


16  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT I, 

PROMETHEUS. 

• 

And  what  art  thou, 
O,  melancholy  Voice  ? 

THE  EARTH. 

I  am  the  Earth, 

Thy  mother ;  she  within  whose  stony  veins, 
To  the  last  fibre  of  the  loftiest  tree 
Whose  thin  leaves  trembled  in  the  frozen  air, 
Joy  ran,  as  blood  within  a  living  frame, 
When  thou  didst  from  her  bosom,  like  a  cloud 
Of  glory,  arise,  a  spirit  of  keen  joy  ! 
And  at  thy  voice  her  pining  sons  uplifted 
Their  prostrate  brows  from  the  polluting  dust,  160 

And  our  almighty  Tyrant  with  fierce  dread 
Grew  pale,  until  his  thunder  chained  thee  here. 
Then,  see  those  million  worlds  which  burn  and  roll 
Around  us  :  their  inhabitants  beheld 
My  sphered  light  wane  in  wide  Heaven ;  the  sea 
Was  lifted  by  strange  tempest,  and  new  fire 
From  earthquake-rifted  mountains  of  bright  snow 
Shook  its  portentous  hair  beneath  Heaven's  frown ; 
Lightning  and  Inundation  vexed  the  plains ; 
Blue  thistles  bloomed  in  cities ;  foodless  toads  170 

Within  voluptuous  chambers  panting  crawled  : 
Where  Plague  had  fallen  on  man,  and  beast,  and  worm, 
And  Famine ;  and  black  blight  on  herb  and  tree ; 
And  in  the  corn,  and  vines,  and  meadow-grass, 
Teemed  ineradicable  poisonous  weeds 
Draining  their  growth,  for  my  wan  breast  was  dry 
With  grief;  and  the  thin  air,  my  breath,  was  stained 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  17 

With  the  contagion  of  a  mother's  hate 

Breathed  on  her  child's  destroyer  ;  aye,  I  heard 

Thy  curse,  the  which,  if  thou  rememberest  not,  180 

Yet  my  innumerable  seas  and  streams, 

Mountains,  and  caves,  and  winds,  and  yon  wide  air, 

And  the  inarticulate  people  of  the  dead, 

Preserve,  a  treasured  spell.     We  meditate 

In  secret  joy  and  hope  those  dreadful  words, 

But  dare  not  speak  them. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Venerabl*  mother  ! 

All  else  who  live  and  suffer  take  from  thee 
Some  comfort ;  flowers,  and  fruits,  and  happy  sounds, 
And  love,  though  fleeting ;  these  may  not  be  mine. 
But  mine  own  words,  I  pray,  deny  me  not.  190 

THE  EARTH. 

They  shall  be  told.     Ere  Babylon  was  dust, 

The  Magus  Zoroaster,  my  dead  child, 

Met  his  own  image  walking  in  the  garden. 

That  apparition,  sole  of  men,  he  saw. 

For  know,  there  are  two  worlds  of  life  and  death : 

One  that  which  thou  beholdest ;  but  the  other 

Is  underneath  the  grave,  where  do  inhabit 

The  shadows  of  all  forms  that  think  and  live 

Till  death  unite  them  and  they  part  no  more ; 

Dreams  and  the  light  imaginings  of  men,  200 

And  all  that  faith  creates  or  love  desires, 

Terrible,  strange,  sublime,  and  beauteous  shapes. 

There  thou  art,  and  dost  hang,  a  writhing  shade, 


18  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

Mid  whirlwind-peopled  mountains  ;  all  the  Gods 

Are  there,  and  all  the  powers  of  nameless  worlds, 

Vast,  sceptred  phantoms  ;  heroes,  men,  and  beasts ; 

And  Demogorgon,  a  tremendous  gloom  ; 

And  he,  the  supreme  Tyrant,  on  his  throne 

Of  burning  gold.     Son,  one  of  these  shall  utter 

The  curse  which  all  remember.     Call  at  will  210 

Thine  own  ghost,  or  the  ghost  of  Jupiter, 

Hades  or  Typhon,  or  what  mightier  Gods 

From  all-prolific  Evil,  since  thy  ruin 

Have  sprung,  and  trampled  on  my  prostrate  sons. 

Ask,  and  they  must  rftply  :  so  the  revenge 

Of  the  Supreme  may  sweep  through  vacant  shades, 

As  rainy  wind  through  the  abandoned  gate 

Of  a  fallen  palace. 

PROMETHEUS. 
Mother,  let  not  aught 
Of  that  which  may  be  evil,  pass  again 

My  lips,  or  those  of  aught  resembling  me.  220 

Phantasm  of  Jupiter,  arise,  appear  ! 

ZONE. 
My  wings  are  folded  o'er  mine  ears : 

My  wings  are  crossed  o'er  mine  eyes : 
Yet  thro'  their  silver  shade  appears, 

And  thro'  their  lulling  plumes  arise, 
A  Shape,  a  throng  of  sounds ; 

May  it  be  no  ill  to  thee 
O  thou  of  many  wounds  ! 
Near  whom,  for  our  sweet  sister's  sake, 
Ever  thus  we  watch  and  wake.  230 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  19 

PANTHEA. 

The  sound  is  of  whirlwind  underground, 

Earthquake,  and  fire,  and  mountains  cloven ; 
The  shape  is  awful  like  the  sound, 

Clothed  in  dark  purple,  star-inwoven. 
A  sceptre  of  pale  gold 

To  stay  steps  proud,  o'er  the  slow  cloud 
His  veined  hand  doth  hold. 
Cruel  he  looks,  but  calm  and  strong, 
Like  one  who  does,  not  suffers  wrong. 

PHANTASM  OF  JUPITER. 

Why  have  the  secret  powers  of  this  strange  world  240 

Driven  me,  a  frail  and  empty  phantom,  hither 

On  direst  storms  ?     What  unaccustomed  sounds 

Are  hovering  on  my  lips,  unlike  the  voice 

With  which  our  pallid  race  hold  ghastly  talk 

In  darkness  ?    And,  proud  sufferer,  who  art  thou  ? 

PROMETHEUS. 

Tremendous  Image,  as  thou  art  must  be 
He  whom  thou  shadowest  forth.     I  am  his  foe, 
The  Titan.     Speak  the  words  which  I  would  hear, 
Although  no  thought  inform  thine  empty  voice. 

THE  EARTH. 

Listen  !     And  tho'  your  echoes  must  be  mute,  250 

Grey  mountains,  and  old  woods,  and  haunted  springs, 
Prophetic  caves,  and  isle-surrounding  streams, 
Rejoice  to  hear  what  yet  ye  cannot  speak. 


20  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

PHANTASM. 

A  spirit  seizes  me  and  speaks  within : 
It  tears  me  as  fire  tears  a  thunder-cloud. 

PANTHEA. 

See,  how  he  lifts  his  mighty  looks,  the  Heaven 
Darkens  above. 

ZONE. 
He  speaks  !     O  shelter  me  ! 

PROMETHEUS. 

I  see  the  curse  on  gestures  proud  and  cold, 

And  looks  of  firm  defiance,  and  calm  hate, 

And  such  despair  as  mocks  itself  with  smiles,  260 

Written  as  on  a  scroll :  yet  speak  :  Oh,  speak  ! 

PHANTASM. 

Fiend,  I  defy  thee  !  with  a  calm,  fixed  mind, 
All  that  thou  canst  inflict  I  bid  thee  do; 

Foul  Tyrant  both  of  Gods  and  Human-kind, 
One  only  being  shalt  thou  not  subdue. 

Rain  then  thy  plagues  upon  me  here, 

Ghastly  disease,  and  frenzying  fear ; 

And  let  alternate  frost  and  fire 

Eat  into  me,  and  be  thine  ire 

Lightning,  and  cutting  hail,  and  legioned  forms          270 
Of  furies,  driving  by  upon  the  wounding  storms. 

Aye,  do  thy  worst.     Thou  art  omnipotent. 
O'er  all  things  but  thyself  I  gave  thee  power, 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  21 

And  my  own  will.     Be  thy  swift  mischiefs  sent 
To  blast  mankind,  from  yon  aetherial  tower. 

Let  thy  malignant  spirit  move 

In  darkness  over  those  I  love  : 

On  me  and  mine  I  imprecate 

The  utmost  torture  of  thy  hate ; 

And  thus  devote  to  sleepless  agony,  280 

This  undeclining  head  while  thou  must  reign  on  high. 

But  thou,  who  art  the  God  and  Lord :  O,  thou, 
Who  fillest  with  thy  soul  this  world  of  woe, 

To  whom  all  things  of  Earth  and  Heaven  do  bow 
In  fear  and  worship  :  all-prevailing  foe  ! 

I  curse  thee  !  let-  a  sufferer's  curse 

Clasp  thee,  his  torturer,  like  remorse ; 

Till  thine  Infinity  shall  be 

A  robe  of  envenomed  agony ; 

And  thine  Omnipotence  a  crown  of  pain,  290 

To  cling  like  burning  gold  round  thy  dissolving  brain. 

Heap  on  thy  soul,  by  virtue  of  this  Curse, 

111  deeds,  then  be  thou  damned,  beholding  good ; 
Both  infinite  as  is  the  universe, 

And  thou,  and  thy  self- torturing  solitude. 
An  awful  image  of  calm  power 
Though  now  thou  sittest,  let  the  hour 
Come,  when  thou  must  appear  to  be 
That  which  thou  art  internally. 

And  after  many  a  false  and  fruitless  crime  300 

Scorn  track  thy  lagging  fall  thro'  boundless  space  and 
time. 


22  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  it 

PROMETHEUS. 
Were  these  my  words,  O,  Parent  ? 

THE  EARTH. 

They  were  thine. 
PROMETHEUS. 

It  doth  repent  me  :  words  are  quick  and  vain ; 

Grief  for  awhile  is  blind,  and  so  was  mine. 
I  wish  no  living  thing  to  suffer  pain. 

THE  EARTH. 

Misery,  Oh  misery  to  me, 

That  Jove  at  length  should  vanquish  thee. 

Wail,  howl  aloud,  Land  and  Sea, 

The  Earth's  rent  heart  shall  answer  ye. 
Howl,  Spirits  of  the  living  and  the  dead,  310 

Your  refuge,  your  defence  lies  fallen  and  vanquished. 

FIRST  ECHO. 
Lies  fallen  and  vanquished  ! 

SECOND  ECHO. 
Fallen  and  vanquished  ! 

IONE. 
Fear  not :  'tis  but  some  passing  spasm, 

The  Titan  is  unvanquished  still. 
But  see,  where  thro'  the  azure  chasm 

Of  yon  forked  and  snowy  hill 
Trampling  the  slant  winds  on  high 

With  golden-sandalled  feet,  that  glow 


4CTJ.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND,  23 

Under  plumes  of  purple  dye,  320 

Like  rose-ensanguined  ivory, 

A  Shape  comes  now, 
Stretching  on  high  from  his  right  hand 

A  serpent-cinctured  wand. 

PANTHEA. 
'Tis  Jove's  world-wandering  herald,  Mercury. 

IONE. 

And  who  are  those  with  hydra  tresses 
And  iron  wings  that  climb  the  wind, 

Whom  the  frowning  God  represses 
Like  vapours  steaming  up  behind, 

Clanging  loud,  an  endless  crowd  —  330 

PANTHEA. 

These  are  Jove's  tempest-walking  hounds, 
Whom  he  gluts  with  groans  and  blood, 
When  charioted  on  sulphurous  cloud 
He  bursts  Heaven's  bounds. 

IONE. 

Are  they  now  led,  from  the  thin  dead 
On  new  pangs  to  be  fed? 

PANTHEA. 
The  Titan  looks  as  ever,  firm,  not  proud. 

FIRST  FURY. 
Ha  !  I  scent  life  ! 


24  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

SECOND  FURY. 
Let  me  but  look  into  his  eyes  ! 

THIRD  FURY. 

The  hope  of  torturing  him  smells  like  a  heap  340 

Of  corpses,  to  a  death-bird  after  battle. 

FIRST  FURY. 

Barest  thou  delay,  O  Herald  !     Take  cheer,  Hounds 
Of  Hell :  what  if  the  Son  of  Maia  soon 
Should  make  us  food  and  sport  —  who  can  please  long 
The  Omnipotent? 

MERCURY. 

Back  to  your  towers  of  iron, 
And  gnash,  beside  the  streams  of  fire  and  wail, 
Your  foodless  teeth.     Geryon,  arise  !  and  Gorgon, 
Chimaera,  and  thou  Sphinx,  subtlest  of  fiends 
Who  ministered  to  Thebes  Heaven's  poisoned  wine, 
Unnatural  love,  and  more  unnatural  hate  :  350 

These  shall  perform  your  task. 

FIRST  FURY. 

Oh,  mercy  !  mercy ! 
We  die  with  our  desire  :  drive  us  not  back  ! 

MERCURY. 
Crouch  then  in  silence. 

Awful  Sufferer 

To  thee  unwilling,  most  unwillingly 
I  come,  by  the  great  Father's  will  driven  down, 
To  execute  a  doom  of  new  revenge. 


ACT  i.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  25 

Alas  !  I  pity  thee,  and  hate  myself 

That  I  can  do  no  more  :  aye  from  thy  sight 

Returning,  for  a  season,  Heaven  seems  Hell, 

So  thy  worn  form  pursues  me  night  and  day,  360 

Smiling  reproach.     Wise  art  thou,  firm  and  good,   ^ 

But  vainly  wouldst  stand  forth  alone  in  strife 

Against  the  Omnipotent ;  as  yon  clear  lamps 

That  measure  and  divide  the  weary  years 

From  which  there  is  no  refuge,  long  have  taught 

And  long  must  teach.     Even  now  thy  Torturer  arms 

With  the  strange  might  of  unimagined  pains 

The  powers  who  scheme  slow  agonies  in  Hell, 

And  my  commission  is  to  lead  them  here, 

Or  what  more  subtle,  foul,  or  savage  fiends  370 

People  the  abyss,  and  leave  them  to  their  task. 

Be  it  not  so  !  there  is  a  secret  known 

To  thee,  and  to  none  else  of  living  things, 

Which  may  transfer  the  sceptre  of  wide  Heaven, 

The  fear  of  which  perplexes  the  Supreme  : 

Clothe  it  in  words,  and  bid  it  clasp  his  throne 

In  intercession ;  bend  thy  soul  in  prayer, 

And  like  a  suppliant  in  some  gorgeous  fane, 

Let  the  will  kneel  within  thy  haughty  heart :  } 

For  benefits  and  meek  submission  tame  380 

The  fiercest  and  the  mightiest. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Evil  minds 

Change  good  to  their  own  nature.     I  gave  all 
He  has ;  and  in  return  he  chains  me  here 
Years,  ages,  night  and  day  :  whether  the  Sun 


26  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

Split  my  parched  skin,  or  in  the  moony  night 

The  crystal-winged  snow  cling  round  my  hair : 

Whilst  my  beloved  race  is  trampled  down 

By  his  thought-executing  ministers. 

Such  is  the  tyrant's  recompense  :  'tis  just : 

He  who  is  evil  can  receive  no  good ;  390 

And  for  a  world  bestowed,  or  a  friend  lost, 

He  can  feel  hate,  fear,  shame  ;  not  gratitude  : 

He  but  requites  me  for  his  own  misdeed. 

Kindness  to  such  is  keen  reproach,  which  breaks 

With  bitter  stings  the  light  sleep  of  Revenge. 

Submission,  thou  dost  know  I  cannot  try : 

For  what  submission  but  that  fatal  word, 

The  death-seal  of  mankind's  captivity, 

Like  the  Sicilian's  hair-suspended  sword, 

Which  trembles  o'er  his  crown,  would  he  accept,  400 

Or  could  I  yield  ?     Which  yet  I  will  not  yield. 

Let  others  flatter  Crime,  where  it  sits  throned 

In  brief  Omnipotence  :  secure  are  they  : 

For  Justice,  when  triumphant,  will  weep  down 

Pity,  not  punishment,  on  her  own  wrongs, 

Too  much  avenged  by  those  who  err.     I  wait, 

Enduring  thus,  the  retributive  hour 

Which  since  we  spake  is  even  nearer  now. 

But  hark,  the  hell-hounds  clamour  :  fear  delay  : 

Behold  !  Heaven  lowers  under  thy  Father's  frown.  410 

MERCURY. 

Oh,  that  we  might  be  spared  :  I  to  inflict 
And  thou  to  suffer  !     Once  more  answer  me : 
Thou  knowest  not  the  period  of  Jove's  power? 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND,  27 

PROMETHEUS. 
I  know  but  this,  that  it  must  come. 

MERCURY. 

Alas! 
Thou  canst  not  count  thy  years  to  come  of  pain  ? 

PROMETHEUS. 

They  last  while  Jove  must  reign  :  nor  more,  nor  less 
Do  I  desire  or  fear. 

MERCURY. 

Yet  pause,  and  plunge 
Into  Eternity,  where  recorded  time, 
Even  all  that  we  imagine,  age  on  age, 
Seems  but  a  point,  and  the  reluctant  mind  420 

Flags  wearily  in  its  unending  flight, 
Till  it  sink,  dizzy,  blind,  lost,  shelterless  ; 
Perchance  it  has  not  numbered  the  slow  years 
Which  thou  must  spend  in  torture,  unreprieved  ? 

PROMETHEUS. 
Perchance  no  thought  can  count  them,  yet  they  pass. 

MERCURY. 

If  thou  might'st  dwell  among  the  Gods  the  while 
Lapped  in  voluptuous  joy? 

• 
PROMETHEUS. 

I  would  not  quit 
This  bleak  ravine,  these  unrepentant  pains. 


28  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

MERCURY. 
Alas  !  I  wonder  at,  yet  pity  thee. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Pity  the  self-despising  slaves  of  Heaven,  430 

Not  me,  within  whose  mind  sits  peace  serene, 
As  light  in  the  sun,  throned  :  how  vain  is  talk  ! 
Call  up  the  fiends. 

IONE. 

O,  sister,  look  !     White  fire 

Has  cloven  to  the  roots  yon  huge  snow-loaded  cedar  j 
How  fearfully  God's  thunder  howls  behind  ! 

MERCURY. 

I  must  obey  his  words  and  thine  :  alas  ! 
Most  heavily  remorse  hangs  at  my  heart ! 

PANTHEA. 

See  where  the  child  of  Heaven,  with  winged  feet, 
Runs  down  the  slanted  sunlight  of  the  dawn. 

IONE. 

Dear  sister,  close  thy  plumes  over  thine  eyes  440 

Lest  thou  behold  and  die  :  they  come  :  they  come 
Blackening  the  birth  of  day  with  countless  wings, 
And  hollow  underneath,  like  death. 

FIRST  FURY. 

Prometheus ! 

SECOND  FURY. 
Immortal  Titan ! 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  29 

THIRD  FURY. 
Champion  of  Heaven's  slaves  ! 

PROMETHEUS. 

He  whom  some  dreadful  voice  invokes  is  here, 

Prometheus,  the  chained  Titan.     Horrible  forms, 

What  and  who  are  ye  ?    Never  yet  there  came 

Phantasms  so  foul  thro'  monster-teeming  Hell 

From  the  all-miscreative  brain  of  Jove ; 

Whilst  I  behold  such  execrable  shapes,  450 

Methinks  I  grow  like  what  I  contemplate, 

And  laugh  and  stare  in  loathsome  sympathy. 

FIRST  FURY. 

We  are  the  ministers  of  pain,  and  fear, 
And  disappointment,  and  mistrust,  and  hate, 
And  clinging  crime  ;  and  as  lean  dogs  pursue 
Thro'  wood  and  lake  some  struck  and  sobbing  fawn,' 
We  track  all  things  that  weep,  and  bleed,  and  live, 
When  the  great  King  betrays  them  to  our  will. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Oh  !  many  fearful  natures  in  one  name, 

I  know  ye ;  and  these  lakes  and  echoes  know  460 

The  darkness  and  the  clangour  of  your  wings. 

But  why  more  hideous  than  your  loathed  selves 

Gather  ye  up  in  legions  from  the  deep  ? 

SECOND  FURY. 
We  knew  not  that :  Sisters,  rejoice,  rejoice.  ! 


30  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

PROMETHEUS. 
Can  aught  exult  in  its  deformity? 

SECOND  FURY. 

The  beauty  of  delight  makes  lovers  glad, 

Gazing  on  one  another  :  so  are  we. 

As  from  the  rose  which  the  pale  priestess  kneels 

To  gather  for  her  festal  crown  of  flowers 

The  aerial  crimson  falls,  flushing  her  cheek,  470 

So  from  our  victim's  destined  agony 

The  shade  which  is  our  form  invests  us  round, 

Else  we  are  shapeless  as  our  mother  Night. 

PROMETHEUS. 

I  laugh  your  power,  and  his  who  sent  you  here, 
To  lowest  scorn.     Pour  forth  the  cup  of  pain. 

FIRST  FURY. 

Thou  thinkest  we  will  rend  thee  bone  from  bone, 
And  nerve  from  nerve,  working  like  fire  within? 

PROMETHEUS. 

Pain  is  my  element,  as  hate  is  thine ; 
Ye  rend  me  now  :  I  care  not. 

SECOND  FURY. 

Dost  imagine 
We  will  but  laugh  into  thy  lidless  eyes?  480 

PROMETHEUS. 
I  weigh  not  what  ye  do,  but  what  ye  suffer, 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  31 

Being  evil.     Cruel  was  the  power  which  called 
You,  or  aught  else  so  wretched,  into  light. 

THIRD  FURY. 

Thou  think'st  we  will  live  thro'  thee,  one  by  one, 

Like  animal  life,  and  tho'  we  can  obscure  not 

The  soul  which  burns  within,  that  we  will  dwell 

Beside  it,  like  a  vain  loud  multitude 

Vexing  the  self-content  of  wisest  men  : 

That  we  will  be  dread  thought  beneath  thy  brain, 

And  foul  desire  round  thy  astonished  heart,  490 

And  blood  within  thy  labyrinthine  veins 

Crawling  like  agony. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Why,  ye  are  thus  now ; 
Yet  am  I  king  over  myself,  and  rule 
The  torturing  and  conflicting  throngs  within, 
As  Jove  rules  you  when  Hell  grows  mutinous. 

CHORUS  OF  FURIES. 

From  the  ends  of  the  earth,  from  the  ends  of  the  earth, 
Where  the  night  has  its  grave  and  the  morning  its  birth, 

Come,  come,  come  ! 

Oh,  ye  who  shake  hills  with  the  scream  of  your  mirth, 
When  cities  sink  howling  in  ruin  ;  and  ye  500 

Who  with  wingless  footsteps  trample  the  sea, 
And  close  upon  Shipwreck  and  Famine's  track, 
Sit  chattering  with  joy  on  the  foodless  wreck  j 

Come,  come,  come  ! 


32  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  7, 

Leave  the  bed,  low,  cold,  and  red, 
Strewed  beneath  a  nation  dead ; 
Leave  the  hatred,  as  in  ashes 

Fire  is  left  for  future  burning : 
It  will  burst  in  bloodier  flashes 

When  ye  stir  it,  soon  returning  :  510 

Leave  the  self-contempt  implanted 
In  young  spirits,  sense-enchanted, 

Misery's  yet  unkindled  fuel : 
Leave  Hell's  secrets  half  unchanted 

To  the  maniac  dreamer ;  cruel 
More  than  ye  can  be  with  hate 

Is  he  with  fear. 
Come,  come,  come  ! 
We  are  steaming  up  from  Hell's  wide  gate 

And  we  burthen  the  blasts  of  the  atmosphere,  520 

But  vainly  we  toil  till  ye  come  here. 

IONE. 
Sister,  I  hear  the  thunder  of  new  wings. 

PANTHEA. 

These  solid  mountains  quiver  with  the  sound 
Even  as  the  tremulous  air  :  their  shadows  make 
The  space  within  my  plumes  more  black  than  night. 

FIRST  FURY. 

Your  call  was  as  a  winged  car 
Driven  on  whirlwinds  fast  and  far ; 
It  rapt  us  from  red  gulphs  of  war. 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  33 

SECOND  FURY. 
From  wide  cities,  famine-wasted ; 

THIRD  FURY. 
Groans  half  heard,  and  blood  untasted ;  530 

FOURTH  FURY. 

Kingly  conclaves  stern  and  cold, 
Where  blood  with  gold  is  bought  and  sold ; 

FIFTH  FURY. 

From  the  furnace,  white  and  hot, 
In  which  — 

A  FURY. 

Speak  not :  whisper  not : 
I  know  all  that  ye  would  tell, 
But  to  speak  might  break  the  spell 
Which  must  bend  the  Invincible, 

The  stern  of  thought ; 
He  yet  defies  the  deepest  power  of  Hell. 

FURY. 
Tear  the  veil ! 

ANOTHER  FURY. 
It  is  torn. 

CHORUS. 

The  pale  stars  of  the  morn    540 
Shine  on  a  misery,  dire  to  be  borne. 
Dost  thou  faint,  mighty  Titan  ?    We  laugh  thee  to  scorn. 
Dost  thou  boast  the  clear  knowledge  thou  waken'dst  for 
man? 


34  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

Then  was  kindled  within  him  a  thirst  which  outran 
Those  perishing  waters ;  a  thirst  of  fierce  fever, 
Hope,  love,  doubt,  desire,  which  consume  him  for  ever. 
One  came  forth  of  gentle  worth, 
Smiling  on  the  sanguine  earth  ; 
His  words  outlived  him,  like  swift  poison 

Withering  up  truth,  peace,  and  pity.  55o 

Look  !  where  round  the  wide  horizon 

Many  a  million- peopled  city 
Vomits  smoke  in  the  bright  air. 
Mark  that  outcry  of  despair  ! 
'Tis  his  mild  and  gentle  ghost 

Wailing  for  the  faith  he  kindled  : 
Look  again,  the  flames  almost 

To  a  glow-worm's  lamp  have  dwindled  : 
The  survivors  round  the  embers 

Gather  in  dread.  560 

Joy,  joy,  joy  ! 

Past  ages  crowd  on  thee,  but  each  one  remembers, 
And  the  future  is  dark,  and  the  present  is  spread 
Like  a  pillow  of  thorns  for  thy  slumberless  head. 

SEMICHORUS  I. 

Drops  of  bloody  agony  flow 

From  his  white  and  quivering  brow. 

Grant  a  little  respite  now  : 

See  a  disenchanted  nation 

Springs  like  day  from  desolation ; 

To  Truth  its  state  is  dedicate,  570 

And  Freedom  leads  it  forth,  her  mate ; 


Acri.J  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  35 

A  legioned  band  of  linked  brothers 
Whom  Love  calls  children  — 

SEMICHORUS  II. 

Tis  another's : 

See  how  kindred  murder  kin  : 
'Tis  the  vintage-time  for  death  and  sin  : 
Blood,  like  new  wine,  bubbles  within  : 

Till  Despair  smothers 
The  struggling  world,  which  slaves  and  tyrants  win. 

\Att  the  FURIES  vanish  except  one. 

lONE. 

Hark,  sister  !  what  a  low  yet  dreadful  groan, 

Quite  unsuppressed  is  tearing  up  the  heart  580 

Of  the  good  Titan,  as  storms  tear  the  deep, 

And  beasts  hear  the  sea  moan  in  inland  caves. 

Barest  thou  observe  how  the  fiends  torture  him? 

PANTHEA. 
Alas  !  I  looked  forth  twice,  but  will  no  more. 

IONE. 
What  didst  thou  see  ? 

PANTHEA. 

A  woful  sight :  a  youth 
With  patient  looks  nailed  to  a  crucifix. 

IONE. 
What  next  ? 


36  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

PANTHEA. 

The  heaven  around,  the  earth  below 
Was  peopled  with  thick  shapes  of  human  death, 
All  horrible,  and  wrought  by  human  hands, 
And  some  appeared  the  work  of  human  hearts,  590 

For  men  were  slowly  killed  by  frowns  and  smiles : 
And  other  sights  too  foul  to  speak  and  live 
Were  wandering  by.     Let  us  not  tempt  worse  fear 
By  looking  forth  :  those  groans  are  grief  enough. 

FURY. 

Behold  an  emblem  :  those  who  do  endure 

Deep  wrongs  for  man,  and  scorn,  and  chains,  but  heap 

Thousandfold  torment  on  themselves  and  him. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Remit  the  anguish  of  that  lighted  stare ; 

Close  those  wan  lips  ;  let  that  thorn-wounded  brow 

Stream  not  with  blood ;  it  mingles  with  thy  tears  !  600 

Fix,  fix  those  tortured  orbs  in  peace  and  death, 

So  thy  sick  throes  shake  not  that  crucifix, 

So  those  pale  fingers  play  not  with  thy  gore. 

O,  horrible  !     Thy  name  I  will  not  speak, 

It  hath  become  a  curse.     I  see,  I  see 

The  wise,  the  mild,  the  lofty,  and  the  just, 

Whom  thy  slaves  hate  for  being  like  to  thee, 

Some  hunted  by  foul  lies  from  their  heart's  home, 

An  early-chosen,  late-lamented  home ; 

As  hooded  ounces  cling  to  the  driven  hind ;  610 

Some  linked  to  corpses  in  unwholesome  cells  : 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  37 

Some  —  Hear  I  not  the  multitude  laugh  loud  ?  — 
Impaled  in  lingering  fire  :  and  mighty  realms 
Float  by  my  feet,  like  sea-uprooted  isles, 
Whose  sons  are  kneaded  down  in  common  blood 
By  the  red  light  of  their  own  burning  homes. 

FURY. 

Blood  thou  canst  see,  and  fire  ;  and  canst  hear  groans  ; 
Worse  things,  unheard,  unseen,  remain  behind. 

PROMETHEUS. 
Worse? 

FURY. 

In  each  human  heart  terror  survives 

The  ruin  it  has  gorged  :  the  loftiest  fear  620 

All  that  they  would  disdain  to  think  were  true : 
Hypocrisy  and  custom  make  their  minds 
The  fanes  of  many  a  worship,  now  outworn. 
They  dare  not  devise  good  for  man's  estate, 
And  yet  they  know  not  that  they  do  not  dare. 
The  good  want  power,  but  to  weep  barren  tears. 
The  powerful  goodness  want :  worse  need  for  them. 
The  wise  want  love  ;  and  those  who  love  want  wisdom ; 
And  all  best  things  are  thus  confused  to  ill. 
Many  are  strong  and  rich,  and  would  be  just,  630 

But  live  among  their  suffering  fellow-men 
As  if  none  felt :  they  know  not  what  they  do. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Thy  words  are  like  a  cloud  of  winged  snakes ; 
And  yet  I  pity  those  they  torture  not. 


38  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

FURY. 
Thou  pitiest  them  ?     I  speak  no  more  !          [  Vanishes, 

PROMETHEUS. 

Ah  woe  ! 

Ah  woe  !     Alas  !  pain,  pain  ever,  for  ever  ! 
I  close  my  tearless  eyes,  but  see  more  clear 
Thy  works  within  my  woe-illumed  mind, 
Thou  subtle  tyrant !     Peace  is  in  the  grave. 
The  grave  hides  all  things  beautiful  and  good  :  640 

I  am  a  God  and  cannot  find  it  there, 
Nor  would  I  seek  it :  for,  though  dread  revenge, 
This  is  defeat,  fierce  king,  not  victory. 
The  sights  with  which  thou  torturest  gird  my  soul 
With  new  endurance,  till  the  hour  arrives 
When  they  shall  be  no  types  of  things  which  are. 

PANTHEA. 
Alas  !  what  sawest  thou  ? 

PROMETHEUS. 

There  are  two  woes ; 

To  speak,  and  to  behold ;  thou  spare  me  one. 
Names  are  there,  Nature's  sacred  watchwords,  they 
Were  borne  aloft  in  bright  emblazonry ;  650 

The  nations  thronged  around,  and  cried  aloud, 
As  with  one  voice,  Truth,  liberty,  and  love  ! 
Suddenly  fierce  confusion  fell  from  heaven 
Among  them  :  there  was  strife,  deceit,  and  fear : 
Tyrants  rushed  in,  and  did  divide  the  spoil. 
This  was  the  shadow  of  the  truth  I  saw. 


ACT  i.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  39 

THE  EARTH. 

I  felt  thy  torture,  son,  with  such  mixed  joy 

As  pain  and  virtue  give.     To  cheer  thy  state 

I  bid  ascend  those  subtle  and  fair  spirits, 

Whose  homes  are  the  dim  caves  of  human  thought,  660 

And  who  inhabit,  as  birds  wing  the  wind, 

Its  world-surrounding  aether  :  they  behold 

Beyond  that  twilight  realm,  as  in  a  glass, 

The  future  :  may  they  speak  comfort  to  thee  ! 

PANTHEA. 

Look,  sister,  where  a  troop  of  spirits  gather, 

Like  flocks  of  clouds  in  spring's  delightful  weather, 

Thronging  in  the  blue  air  ! 

TONE. 

And  see  !  more  come, 

Like  fountain- vapours  when  the  winds  are  dumb, 
That  climb  up  the  ravine  in  scattered  lines. 
And,  hark  !  is  it  the  music  of  the  pines  ?  670 

Is  it  the  lake  ?     Is  it  the  waterfall  ? 

PANTHEA. 
Tis  something  sadder,  sweeter  far  than  all. 

CHORUS  OF  SPIRITS. 
From  unremembered  ages  we 
Gentle  guides  and  guardians  be 
Of  heaven-oppressed  mortality ; 
And  we  breathe,  and  sicken  not, 
The  atmosphere  of  human  thought : 


40  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

Be  it  dim,  and  dank,  and  grey, 
Like  a  storm-extinguished  day, 
Travelled  o'er  by  dying  gleams ;  680 

Be  it  bright  as  all  between 
Cloudless  skies  and  windless  streams, 

Silent,  liquid,  and  serene  ; 
As  the  birds  within  the  wind, 

As  the  fish  within  the  wave, 
As  the  thoughts  of  man's  own  mind 

Float  thro'  all  above  the  grave ; 
We  make  there  our  liquid  lair, 
Voyaging  cloudlike  and  unpent 
Thro'  the  boundless  element :  690 

Thence  we  bear  the  prophecy 
Which  begins  and  ends  in  thee  ! 

IONE. 

More  yet  come,  one  by  one  :  the  air  around  them 
Looks  radiant  as  the  air  around  a  star. 

FIRST  SPIRIT. 

On  a  battle-trumpet's  blast 

I  fled  hither,  fast,  fast,  fast, 

'Mid  the  darkness  upward  cast. 

From  the  dust  of  creeds  outworn, 

From  the  tyrant's  banner  torn, 

Gathering  'round  me,  onward  borne,  700 

There  was  mingled  many  a  cry  — 

Freedom  !  Hope  !  Death  !  Victory  ! 

Till  they  faded  thro'  the  sky ; 

And  one  sound,  above,  around, 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  41 

One  sound,  beneath,  around,  above, 
Was  moving ;  'twas  the  soul  of  love ; 
'Twas  the  hope,  the  prophecy, 
Which  begins  and  ends  in  thee. 

SECOND  SPIRIT. 

A  rainbow's  arch  stood  on  the  sea 

Which  rocked  beneath,  immovably ;  710 

And  the  triumphant  storm  did  flee, 

Like  a  conqueror,  swift  and  proud, 

Between,  with  many  a  captive  cloud, 

A  shapeless,  dark  and  rapid  crowd, 

Each  by  lightning  riven  in  half : 

I  heard  the  thunder  hoarsely  laugh : 

Mighty  fleets  were  strewn  like  chaff 

And  spread  beneath  a  hell  of  death 

O'er  the  white  waters.     I  alit 

On  a  great  ship  lightning- split,  720 

And  speeded  hither  on  the  sigh 

Of  one  who  gave  an  enemy 

His  plank,  then  plunged  aside  to  die. 

THIRD  SPIRIT. 

I  sate  beside  a  sage's  bed, 

And  the  lamp  was  burning  red 

Near  the  book  where  he  had  fed, 

When  a  Dream  with  plumes  of  flame, 

To  his  pillow  hovering  came, 

And  I  knew  it  was  the  same 

Which  had  kindled  long  ago  730.. 

Pity,  eloquence,  and  woe ; 


42  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

And  the  world  awhile  below 
Wore  the  shade,  its  lustre  made. 
It  has  borne  me  here  as  fleet 
As  Desire's  lightning  feet : 
I  must  ride  it  back  ere  morrow, 
Or  the  sage  will  wake  in  sorrow. 

FOURTH  SPIRIT. 

On  a  poet's  lips  I  slept 

Dreaming  like  a  love-adept 

In  the  sound  his  breathing  kept ;  740 

Nor  seeks  nor  finds  he  mortal  blisses, 

But  feeds  on  the  aerial  kisses 

Of  shapes  that  haunt  thought's  wildernesses. 

He  will  watch  from  dawn  to  gloom 

The  lake-reflected  sun  illume 

The  yellow  bees  in  the  ivy-bloom, 

Nor  heed  nor  see  what  things  they  be ; 

But  from  these  create  he  can 

Forms  more  real  than  living  man, 

Nurslings  of  immortality  !  750 

One  of  these  awakened  me, 

And  I  sped  to  succour  thee. 

IONE. 

Behold'st  thou  not  two  shapes  from  the  east  and  west 

Come,  as  two  doves  to  one  beloved  nest, 

Twin  nurslings  of  the  all-sustaining  air 

On  swift  still  wings  glide  down  the  atmosphere  ? 

And,  hark  !  their  sweet,  sad  voices  !  'tis  despair 

Mingled  with  love,  and  then  dissolved  in  sound. 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  43 

PANTHEA. 
Canst  thou  speak,  sister  ?  all  my  words  are  drowned. 

IONE. 

Their  beauty  gives  me  voice.     See  how  they  float  760 

On  their  sustaining  wings  of  skiey  grain, 
Orange  and  azure  deepening  into  gold  : 
Their  soft  smiles  light  the  air  like  a  star's  fire. 

CHORUS  OF  SPIRITS. 
Hast  thou  beheld  the  form  of  Love  ? 

FIFTH  SPIRIT. 

As  over  wide  dominions 
I  sped,  like  some  swift  cloud  that  wings  the  wide  air's 

wildernesses, 
That  planet-crested  shape  swept  by  on  lightning-braided 

pinions, 
Scattering   the  liquid  joy  of  life  from   his  ambrosial 

tresses : 
His  footsteps  paved  the  world  with  light;   but  as  I 

passed  'twas  fading, 
And  hollow  Ruin  yawned  behind  :  great  sages  bound  in 

madness, 
And  headless  patriots,  and  pale  youths  who  perished, 

unupbraiding,  770 

Gleamed  in  the  night.     I  wandered  o'er,  till  thou,  O 

King  of  sadness, 
Turned  by  thy  smile  the  worst  I  saw  to  recollected       « 

gladness. 


44  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  I. 

SIXTH  SPIRIT. 

Ah,  sister  !     Desolation  is  a  delicate  thing  : 
It  walks  not  on  the  earth,  it  floats  not  on  the  air, 
But  treads  with  killing  footstep,  and  fans  with  silent 

wing 
The  tender  hopes  which  in  their  hearts  the  best  and 

gentlest  bear ; 
Who,  soothed  to  false  repose  by  the  fanning  plumes 

above 

And  the  music-stirring  motion  of  its  soft  and  busy  feet, 
Dream  visions  of  aerial  joy,  and  call  the  monster,  Love, 
And  wake,  and  find  the  shadow  Pain,  as  he  whom  now 

we  greet.  780 

CHORUS. 

Tho'  Ruin  now  Love's  shadow  be, 

Following  him,  destroyingly, 

On  Death's  white  and  winged  steed, 

Which  the  fleetest  cannot  flee, 

Trampling  down  both  flower  and  weed, 

Man  and  beast,  and  foul  and  fair, 

Like  a  tempest  thro'  the  air ; 

Thou  shalt  quell  this  horseman  grim, 

Woundless  though  in  heart  or  limb. 

PROMETHEUS. 
Spirits  !  how  know  ye  this  shall  be  ?  790 

CHORUS. 

In. the  atmosphere  we  breathe, 
As  buds  grow  red  when  the  snow-storms  flee, 
From  spring  gathering  up  beneath, 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  45 

Whose  mild  winds  shake  the  elder  brake, 
And  the  wandering  herdsmen  know 
That  the  white-thorn  soon  will  blow  : 
Wisdom,  Justice,  Love,  and  Peace, 
When  they  struggle  to  increase, 

Are  to  us  as  soft  winds  be 

To  shepherd-boys,  the  prophecy  800 

Which  begins  and  ends  in  thee. 

IONE. 
Where  are  the  Spirits  fled  ? 

PANTHEA.. 

Only  a  sense 

Remains  of  them,  like  the  omnipotence 
Of  music,  when  the  inspired  voice  and  lute 
Languish,  ere  yet  the  responses  are  mute, 
Which  thro'  the  deep  and  labyrinthine  soul, 
Like  echoes  thro'  long  caverns,  wind  and  roll. 

PROMETHEUS. 

How  fair  these  air-born  shapes  !     And  yet  I  feel 

Most  vain  all  hope  but  love  ;  and  thou  art  far, 

Asia  !  who,  when  my  being  overflowed,  810 

Wert  like  a  golden  chalice  to  bright  wine 

Which  else  had  sunk  into  the  thirsty  dust. 

All  things  are  still :  alas  !  how  heavily 

This  quiet  morning  weighs  upon  my  heart ; 

Tho'  I  should  dream  I  could  even  sleep  with  grief 

If  slumber  were  denied  not.     I  would  fain 

Be  what  it  is  my  destiny  to  be, 


46         .  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  I.] 

The  saviour  and  the  strength  of  suffering  man, 

Or  sink  into  the  original  gulph  of  things : 

There  is  no  agony,  and  no  solace  left ;  820 

Earth  can  console,  Heaven  can  torment  no  more. 

PANTHEA. 

Hast  thou  forgotten  one  who  watches  thee 
The  cold  dark  night,  and  never  sleeps  but  when 
The  shadow  of  thy  spirit  falls  on  her  ? 

PROMETHEUS. 
I  said  all  hope  was  vain  but  love  :  thou  lovest. 

PANTHEA. 

Deeply  in  truth;  but  the  eastern  star  looks  white, 

And  Asia  waits  in  that  far  Indian  vale 

The  scene  of  her  sad  exile ;  rugged  once 

And  desolate  and  frozen,  like  this  ravine ; 

But  now  invested  with  fair  flowers  and  herbs,  830 

And  haunted  by  sweet  airs  and  sounds,  which  flow 

Among  the  woods  and  waters,  from  the  aether 

Of  her  transforming  presence,  which  would  fade 

If  it  were  mingled  not  with  thine.     Farewell ! 


ACT  II. 

SCENE  I. — Morning.    A  lovely  Vale  in  the  Indian  Caucasus, 
ASIA  alone. 

ASIA. 

From  all  the  blasts  of  heaven  thou  hast  descended : 

Yes,  like  a  spirit,  like  a  thought,  which  makes 

Unwonted  tears  throng  to  the  horny  eyes, 

And  beatings  haunt  the  desolated  heart, 

Which  should  have  learnt  repose  :  thou  hast  descended, 

Cradled  in  tempests ;  thou  dost  wake,  O  Spring  ! 

O  child  of  many  winds  !    As  suddenly 

Thou  comest  as  the  memory  of  a  dream, 

Which  now  is  sad  because  it  hath  been  sweet ; 

Like  genius,  or  like  joy  which  riseth  up  10 

As  from  the  earth,  clothing  with  golden  clouds 

The  desart  of  our  life. 

This  is  the  season,  this  the  day,  the  hour ; 

At  sunrise  thou  shouldst  come,  sweet  sister  mine, 

Too  long  desired,  too  long  delaying,  come  ! 

How  like  death-worms  the  wingless  moments  crawl !      , 

The  point  of  one  white  star  is  quivering  still 

Deep  in  the  orange  light  of  widening  morn 

Beyond  the  purple  mountains  :  thro'  a  chasm 

Of  wind-divided  mist  the  darker  lake  20 

Reflects  it :  now  it  wanes  :  it  gleams  again 

47 


48  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

As  the  waves  fade,  and  as  the  burning  threads 

Of  woven  cloud  unravel  in  pale  air  : 

Tis  lost !  and  through  yon  peaks  of  cloud-like  snow 

The  roseate  sunlight  quivers  :  hear  I  not 

The  ^Eolian  music  of  her  sea-green  plumes 

Winnowing  the  crimson  dawn?  [PANTHEA  enters. 

I  feel,  I  see 

Those  eyes  which  burn  thro'  smiles  that  fade  in  tears, 
Like  stars  half  quenched  in  mists  of  silver  dew. 
Beloved  and  most  beautiful,  who  wearest  30 

The  shadow  of  that  soul  by  which  I  live, 
How  late  thou  art !  the  sphered  sun  had  climbed 
The  sea ;  my  heart  was  sick  with  hope,  before 
The  printless  air  felt  thy  belated  plumes. 

PANTHEA. 

Pardon,  great  Sister  !  but  my  wings  were  faint 

With  the  delight  of  a  remembered  dream, 

As  are  the  noontide  plumes  of  summer  winds 

Satiate  with  sweet  flowers.     I  was  wont  to  sleep 

Peacefully,  and  awake  refreshed  and  calm 

Before  the  sacred  Titan's  fall,  and  thy  40 

Unhappy  love,  had  made,  thro'  use  and  pity, 

Both  love  and  woe  familiar  to  my  heart 

As  they  had  grown  to  thine  :  erewhile  I  slept 

Under  the  glaucous  caverns  of  old  Ocean 

Within  dim  bowers  of  green  and  purple  moss, 

Our  young  Tone's  soft  and  milky  arms 

Locked  then,  as  now,  behind  my  dark  moist  hair, 

While  my  shut  eyes  and  cheek  were  pressed  within 

The  folded  depth  of  her  life-breathing  bosom : 


SCENE  i.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  49 

But  not  as  now,  since  I  am  made  the  wind  50 

Which  fails  beneath  the  music  that  I  bear 

Of  thy  most  wordless  converse  ;  since  dissolved 

Into  the  sense  with  which  love  talks,  my  rest 

Was  troubled  and  yet  sweet ;  my  waking  hours 

Too  full  of  care  and  pain. 

ASIA. 

Lift  up  thine  eyes, 
And  let  me  read  thy  dream. 

PANTHEA. 

As  I  have  said 

With  our  sea-sister  at  his  feet  I  slept. 
The  mountain  mists,  condensing  at  our  voice 
Under  the  moon,  had  spread  their  snowy  flakes, 
From  the  keen  ice  shielding  our  linked  sleep.  60 

Then  two  dreams  came.     One,  I  remember  not. 
But  in  the  other  his  pale  wound-worn  limbs 
Fell  from  Prometheus,  and  the  azure  night 
Grew  radiant  with  the  glory  of  that  form 
Which  lives  unchanged  within,  and  his  voice  fell 
Like  music  which  makes  giddy  the  dim  brain, 
Faint  with  intoxication  of  keen  joy  : 
"  Sister  of  her  whose  footsteps  pave  the  world 
With  loveliness  —  more  fair  than  aught  but  her 
Whose  shadow  thou  art  —  lift  thine  eyes  on  me."  70 

I  lifted  them  :  the  overpowering  light 
Of  that  immortal  shape  was  shadowed  o'er 
By  love  ;  which,  from  his  soft  and  flowing  limbs, 
And  passion-parted  lips,  and  keen,  faint  eyes, 
Steamed  forth  like  vaporous  fire  ;  an  atmosphere 


50  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND,  [ACT  n. 

Which  wrapped  me  in  its  all-dissolving  power, 

As  the  warm  aether  of  the  morning  sun 

Wraps  ere  it  drinks  some  cloud  of  wandering  dew. 

I  saw  not,  heard  not,  moved  not,  only  felt 

His  presence  flow  and  mingle  thro'  my  blood  80 

Till  it  became  his  life,  and  his  grew  mine, 

And  I  was  thus  absorbed,  until  it  past, 

And  like  the  vapours  when  the  sun  sinks  down, 

Gathering  again  in  drops  upon  the  pines, 

And  tremulous  as  they,  in  the  deep  night 

My  being  was  condensed ;  and,  as  the  rays 

Of  thought  were  slowly  gathered,  I  could  hear 

His  voice,  whose  accents  lingered  ere  they  died 

Like  footsteps  of  weak  melody :  thy  name 

Among  the  many  sounds  alone  I  heard  90 

Of  what  might  be  articulate ;  tho'  still 

I  listened  through  the  night  when  sound  was  none. 

lone  wakened  then,  and  said  to  me  : 

"  Canst  thou  divine  what  troubles  me  to-night? 

"  I  always  knew  what  I  desired  before, 

"  Nor  ever  found  delight  to  wish  in  vain. 

"  But  now  I  cannot  tell  thee  what  I  seek ; 

"  I  know  not ;  something  sweet,  since  it  is  sweet 

"  Even  to  desire  ;  it  is  thy  sport,  false  sister ; 

"  Thou  hast  discovered  some  enchantment  old,  100 

"  Whose  spells  have  stolen  my  spirit  as  I  slept 

"  And  mingled  it  with  thine  :  for  when  just  now 

"  We  kissed,  I  felt  within  thy  parted  lips 

"  The  sweet  air  that  sustained  me,  and  the  warmth 

"  Of  the  life-blood,  for  loss  of  which  I  faint, 

"  Quivered  between  our  intertwining  arms." 


SCENE  I.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  51 

I  answered  not,  for  the  Eastern  star  grew  pale, 
But  fled  to  thee. 

ASIA. 

Thou  speakest,  but  thy  words 
Are  as  the  air  :  I  feel  them  not :    Oh,  lift 
Thine  eyes,  that  I  may  read  his  written  soul !  no 

PANTHEA. 

I  lift  them  tho'  they  droop  beneath  the  load 

Of  that  they  would  express  :  what  canst  thou  see 

But  thine  own  fairest  shadow  imaged  there  ? 

ASIA. 

Thine  eyes  are  like  the  deep,  blue,  boundless  heaven 
Contracted  to  two  circles  underneath 
Their  long  fine  lashes  ;  dark,  far,  measureless, 
Orb  within  orb,  and  line  thro'  line  inwoven. 

PANTHEA. 
Why  lookest  thou  as  if  a  spirit  past? 

ASIA. 

There  is  a  change  :  beyond  their  inmost  depth 

I  see  a  shade,  a  shape  :  'tis  He,  arrayed  120 

In  the  soft  light  of  his  own  smiles,  which  spread 

Like  radiance  from  the  cloud-surrounded  moon. 

Prometheus,  it  is  thine  !     Depart  not  yet ! 

Say  not  those  smiles  that  we  shall  meet  again 

Within  that  bright  pavilion  which  their  beams 

Shall  build  on  the  waste  world?    The  dream  is  told. 


52  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

What  shape  is  that  between  us  ?     Its  rude  hair 
Roughens  the  wind  that  lifts  it,  its  regard 
"is  wild  and  quick,  yet  'tis  a  thing  of  air, 
For  thro'  its  grey  robe  gleams  the  golden  dew  130 

Whose  stars  the  noon  has  quenched  not. 

DREAM. 

Follow  !  follow ! 

PANTHEA. 
It  is  mine  other  dream. 

ASIA. 
It  disappears. 

PANTHEA. 

It  passes  now  into  my  mind.     Methought 

As  we  sate  here,  the  flower-infolding  buds 

Burst  on  yon  lightning-blasted  almond-tree, 

When  swift  from  the  white  Scythian  wilderness 

A  wind  swept  forth  wrinkling  the  earth  with  frost : 

I  looked,  and  all  the  blossoms  were  blown  down ; 

But  on  each  leaf  was  stamped,  as  the  blue  bells 

Of  Hyacinth  tell  Apollo's  written  grief,  140 

O,  FOLLOW,  FOLLOW  ! 

ASIA. 

As  you  speak,  your  words 
Fill,  pause  by  pause,  my  own  forgotten  sleep 
With  shapes.     Methought  among  the  lawns  together 
We  wandered,  underneath  the  young  grey  dawn, 
And  multitudes  of  dense  white  fleecy  clouds 
Were  wandering  in  thick  flocks  along  the  mountains 
Shepherded  by  the  slow,  unwilling  wind ; 


SCENE  i.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  53 

And  the  white  dew  on  the  new  bladed  grass, 

Just  piercing  the  dark  earth,  hung  silently : 

And  there  was  more  which  I  remember  not :  150 

But  on  the  shadows  of  the  morning  clouds, 

Athwart  the  purple  mountain  slope,  was  written 

FOLLOW,  O,  FOLLOW  !  as  they  vanished  by, 

And  on  each  herb,  from  which  Heaven's  dew  had  fallen, 

The  like  was  stamped,  as  with  a  withering  fire, 

A  wind  arose  among  the  pines  ;  it  shook 

The  clinging  music  from  their  boughs,  and  then 

Low,  sweet,  faint  sounds,  like  the  farewell  of  ghosts, 

Were  heard  :    O,  FOLLOW,  FOLLOW,  FOLLOW  ME  ! 

And  then  I  said  :  "  Panthea,  look  on  me."  160 

But  in  the  depth  of  those  beloved  eyes 

Still  I  saw,  FOLLOW,  FOLLOW  ! 

ECHO. 

Follow,  follow ! 

PANTHEA. 

The  crags,  this  clear  spring  morning,  mock  our  voices 
As  they  were  spirit-tongued. 

ASIA. 

It  is  some  being 
Around  the  crags.     What  fine  clear  sounds  !     O,  list ! 

ECHOES  (unseen). 
Echoes  we  :  listen  ! 
We  cannot  stay : 
As  dew-stars  glisten 
Then  fade  away — 

Child  of  Ocean  !  170" 


54  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

ASIA. 

Hark  !     Spirits  speak.    The  liquid  responses 
Of  their  aerial  tongues  yet  sound. 

PANTHEA. 

I  hear. 
ECHOES. 
O,  follow,  follow, 

As  our  voice  recedeth 
Thro'  the  caverns  hollow, 
Where  the  forest  spreadeth ; 

(More  distant.) 
O,  follow,  follow ! 
Thro'  the  caverns  hollow, 
As  the  song  floats  thou  pursue, 
Where  the  wild  bee  never  flew,  180 

Thro'  the  noon-tide  darkness  deep, 
By  the  odour-breathing  sleep 
Of  faint  night  flowers,  and  the  waves 
At  the  fountain-lighted  caves, 
While  our  music,  wild  and  sweet, 
Mocks  thy  gently  falling  feet, 
Child  of  Ocean ! 

ASIA. 

Shall  we  pursue  the  sound  ?     It  grows  more  faint 
And  distant. 

PANTHEA. 
List !  the  strain  floats  nearer  now. 


SCENE  ii.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  55 

ECHOES. 
In  the  world  unknown  190 

Sleeps  a  voice  unspoken ; 
By  thy  step  alone 

Can  its  rest  be  broken ; 
Child  of  Ocean ! 

ASIA. 
How  the  notes  sink  upon  the  ebbing  wind  ! 

ECHOES. 

O,  follow,  follow, 
Thro'  the  caverns  hollow, 
As  the  song  floats  thou  pursue, 
By  the  woodland  noon-tide  dew ; 
By  the  forests,  lakes,  and  fountains  200 

Thro'  the  many-folded  mountains ; 
To  the  rents  and  gulphs,  and  chasms, 
Where  the  Earth  reposed  from  spasms, 
On  the  day  when  He  and  thou 
Parted,  to  commingle  now ; 
Child  of  Ocean ! 

ASIA. 

Come,  sweet  Panthea,  link  thy  hand  in  mine, 
And  follow,  ere  the  voices  fade  away. 

SCENE  II. — A  Forest,  intermingled  with  Rocks  and  Caverns. 
ASIA  and  PANTHEA  pass  into  it.  Two  young  Fauns  are 
sitting  on  a  Rock,  listening. 

SEMICHORUS  I.  OF  SPIRITS. 
The  path  thro'  which  that  lovely  twain 

Have  past,  by  cedar,  pine,  and  yew,  aio 


56  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

And  each  dark  tree  that  ever  grew, 

Is  curtained  out  from  Heaven's  wide  blue ; 
Nor  sun,  nor  moon,  nor  wind,  nor  rain, 
Can  pierce  its  interwoven  bowers, 

Nor  aught,  save  where  some  cloud  of  dew, 
Drifted  along  the  earth-creeping  breeze, 
Between  the  trunks  of  the  hoar  trees, 

Hangs  each  a  pearl  in  the  pale  flowers 

Of  the  green  laurel,  blown  anew ; 
And  bends,  and  then  fades  silently,  220 

One  frail  and  fair  anemone  : 
Or  when  some  star  of  many  a  one 
That  climbs  and  wanders  thro'  steep  night, 
Has  found  the  cleft  thro'  which  alone 
Beams  fall  from  high  those  depths  upon 
Ere  it  is  borne  away,  away, 
By  the  swift  Heavens  that  cannot  stay, 
It  scatters  drops  of  golden  light, 
Like  lines  of  rain  that  ne'er  unite  : 
And  the  gloom  divine  is  all  around ;  230 

And  underneath  is  the  mossy  ground. 

SEMICHORUS  II. 

There  the  voluptuous  nightingales, 

Are  awake  thro'  all  the  broad  noonday. 
When  one  with  bliss  or  sadness  fails, 

And  thro'  the  windless  ivy-boughs, 
Sick  with  sweet  love,  droops  dying  away 
On  its  mate's  music-panting  bosom  ; 
Another  from  the  swinging  blossom, 
Watching  to  catch  the  languid  close 


SCENE  ii.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  57 

Of  the  last  strain,  then  lifts  on  high  240 

The  wings  of  the  weak  melody, 
Till  some  new  strain  of  feeling  bear 

The  song,  and  all  the  woods  are  mute ; 
When  there  is  heard  thro'  the  dim  air 
The  rush  of  wings,  and  rising  there 

Like  many  a  lake-surrounded  flute, 
Sounds  overflow  the  listener's  brain 
So  sweet,  that  joy  is  almost  pain. 

SEMICHORUS  I. 

There  those  enchanted  eddies  play 

Of  echoes,  music-tongued,  which  draw,  250 

By  Demogorgon's  mighty  law, 

With  melting  rapture,  or  sweet  awe, 
All  spirits  on  that  secret  way ; 

As  inland  boats  are  driven  to  Ocean 
Down  streams  made  strong  with  mountain-thaw : 
And  first  there  comes  a  gentle  sound 
To  those  in  talk  or  slumber  bound, 

And  wakes  the  destined.     Soft  emotion 
Attracts,  impels  them  :  those  who  saw 

Say  from  the  breathing  earth  behind  260 

There  steams  a  plume-uplifting  wind 
Which  drives  them  on  their  path,  while  they 

Believe  their  own  swift  wings  and  feet 
The  sweet  desires  within  obey  : 
And  so  they  float  upon  their  way, 
Until,  still  sweet,  but  loud  and  strong, 
The  storm  of  sound  is  driven  along, 


58  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

Sucked  up  and  hurrying :  as  they  fleet 

Behind,  its  gathering  billows  meet 
And  to  the  fatal  mountain  bear  270 

Like  clouds  amid  the  yielding  air. 

FIRST  FAUN. 

Canst  thou  imagine  where  those  spirits  live 
Which  make  such  delicate  music  in  the  woods? 
We  haunt  within  the  least  frequented  caves 
And  closest  coverts,  and  we  know  these  wilds, 
Yet  never  meet  them,  tho'  we  hear  them  oft : 
Where  may  they  hide  themselves? 

SECOND  FAUN. 

Tis  hard  to  tell : 

I  have  heard  those  more  skilled  in  spirits  say, 
The  bubbles,  which  the  enchantment  of  the  sun 
Sucks  from  the  pale  faint  water-flowers  that  pave  280 

The  oozy  bottom  of  clear  lakes  and  pools, 
Are  the  pavilions  where  such  dwell  and  float 
Under  the  green  and  golden  atmosphere 
Which  noon-tide  kindles  thro'  the  woven  leaves ; 
And  when  these  burst,  and  the  thin  fiery  air, 
The  which  they  breathed  within  those  lucent  domes, 
Ascends  to  flow  like  meteors  thro'  the  night, 
They  ride  on  them,  and  rein  their  headlong  speed, 
And  bow  their  burning  crests,  and  glide  in  fire 
Under  the  waters  of  the  earth  again.  290 

FIRST  FAUN. 

If  such  live  thus,  have  others  other  lives, 
Under  pink  blossoms  or  within  the  bells 


SCENE  HI.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  59 

Of  meadow  flowers,  or  folded  violets  deep, 
Or  on  their  dying  odours,  when  they  die, 
Or  in  the  sunlight  of  the  sphered  dew  ? 

SECOND  FAUN. 

Aye,  many  more  which  we  may  well  divine. 

But,  should  we  stay  to  speak,  noon-tide  would  come, 

And  thwart  Silenus  find  his  goats  undrawn, 

And  grudge  to  sing  those  wise  and  lovely  songs 

Of  fate,  and  chance,  and  God,  and  Chaos  old,  300 

And  Love,  and  the  chained  Titan's  woful  doom, 

And  how  he  shall  be  loosed,  and  make  the  earth 

One  brotherhood  :  delightful  strains  which  cheer 

Our  solitary  twilights,  and  which  charm 

To  silence  the  unenvying  nightingales. 


SCENE  III. — A  Pinnacle  of  Rock  among  Mountains.     ASIA 
and  PANTHEA. 

PANTHEA. 

Hither  the  sound  has  borne  us  —  to  the  realm 

Of  Demogorgon,  and  the  mighty  portal, 

Like  a  volcano's  meteor-breathing  chasm, 

Whence  the  oracular  vapour  is  hurled  up 

Which  lonely  men  drink  wandering  in  their  youth,  310 

And  call  truth,  virtue,  love,  genius,  or  joy, 

That  maddening  wine  of  life,  whose  dregs  they  drain 

To  deep  intoxication  ;  and  uplift 

Like  Maenads  who  cry  loud,  Evoe  !  Evoe  ! 

The  voice  which  is  contagion  to  the  world. 


60  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

ASIA. 

Fit  throne  for  such  a  Power  !     Magnificent ! 
How  glorious  art  thou,  Earth  !     And,  if  thou  be 
The  shadow  of  some  spirit  lovelier  still, 
Though  evil  stain  its  work,  and  it  should  be 
Like  its  creation,  weak  yet  beautiful,  320 

I  could  fall  down  and  worship  that  and  thee. 
Even  now  my  heart  adoreth  :     Wonderful ! 
Look,  sister,  ere  the  vapour  dim  thy  brain :. 
Beneath  is  a  wide  plain  of  billowy  mist, 
As  a  lake,  paving  in  the  morning  sky, 
With  azure  waves  which  burst  in  silver  light, 
Some  Indian  vale.     Behold  it,  rolling  on 
Under  the  curdling  winds,  and  islanding 
The  peak  whereon  we  stand,  midway,  around, 
Encinctured  by  the  dark  and  blooming  forests,  330 

Dim  twilight-lawns,  and  stream-illumined  caves, 
And  wind-enchanted  shapes  of  wandering  mist ; 
And  far  on  high  the  keen  sky-cleaving  mountains 
From  icy  spires  of  sun-like  radiance  fling 
The  dawn,  as  lifted  Ocean's  dazzling  spray, 
From  some  Atlantic  islet  scattered  up, 
Spangles  the  wind  with  lamp-like  water-drops. 
The  vale  is  girdled  with  their  walls,  a  howl 
Of  cataracts  from  their  thaw-cloven  ravines 
Satiates  the  listening  wind,  continuous,  vast,  340 

Awful  as  silence.     Hark  !  the  rushing  snow ! 
The  sun-awakened  avalanche  !  whose  mass, 
Thrice  sifted  by  the  storm,  had  gathered  there 
Flake  after  flake,  in  heaven-defying  minds 
As  thought  by  thought  is  piled,  till  some  great  truth 


SCENE  in.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  61 

Is  loosened,  and  the  nations  echo  round, 
Shaken  to  their  roots,  as  do  the  mountains  now. 

PANTHEA. 

Look  how  the  gusty  sea  of  mist  is  breaking 

In  crimson  foam,  even  at  our  feet !  it  rises 

As  Ocean  at  the  enchantment  of  the  moon  350 

Round  foodless^nen  wrecked  on  some  oozy  isle. 

ASIA. 

The  fragments  of  the  cloud  are  scattered  up ; 
The  wind  that  lifts  them  disentwines  my  hair ; 
Its  billows  now  sweep  o'er  mine  eyes  ;  my  brain 
Grows  dizzy ;  I  see  thin  shapes  within  the  mist. 

PANTHEA. 

A  countenance  with  beckoning  smiles  :  there  burns 
An  azure  fire  within  its  golden  locks  ! 
Another  and  another  :  hark  !  they  speak  ! 

SONG  OF  SPIRITS. 

To  the  deep,  to  the  deep, 

Down,  down !  360 

Through  the  shade  of  sleep, 
Through  the  cloudy  strife 
Of  Death  and  of  Life ; 

Through  the  veil  and  the  bar 

•*>» 

Of  things  which  seem  and  are 
Even  to  the  steps  of  the  remotest  throne, 
Down,  down ! 


62.  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  11. 

While  the  sound  whirls  around 

Down,  down ! 

As  the  fawn  draws  the  hound,  370 

As  the  lightning  the  vapour, 
As  a  weak  moth  the  taper ; 
Death,  despair ;  love,  sorrow ; 
Time,  both ;  to-day,  to-morrow ; 
As  steel  obeys  the  spirit  of  the  stone, 

Down,  down  ! 

Through  the  grey,  void  abysm, 

Down,  down  ! 
Where  the  air  is  no  prism, 

And  the  moon  and  stars  are  not,  380 

And  the  cavern-crags  wear  not 
The  radiance  of  Heaven 
Nor  the  gloom  to  Earth  given, 
Where  there  is  one  pervading,  one  alone, 

Down,  down  ! 

In  the  depth  of  the  deep, 

Down,  down  ! 

Like  veiled  lightning  asleep, 
Like  the  spark  nursed  in  embers, 
The  last  look  Love  remembers,  390 

Like  a  diamond,  which  shines 
On  the  dark  wealth  of  mines, 
A  spell  is  treasured  but  for  thee  alone. 

Down,  down  ! 

We  have  bound  thee,  we  guide  thee  j 
Down,  down  ! 


SCENE  iv.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  63 

With  the  bright  form  beside  thee ; 
Resist  not  the  weakness, 
§uch  strength  is  in  meekness 

That  the  Eternal,  the  Immortal,  4°° 

Must  unloose  through  life's  portal 
The  snake-like  Doom  coiled  underneath  his 
throne 

By  that  alone. 

SCENE  IV. — The  Cave  of  DEMOGORGON.    ASIA  and  PANTHEA. 

PANTHEA. 
What  veiled  form  sits  on  that  ebon  throne  ? 

ASIA. 
The  veil  has  fallen. 

PANTHEA. 

I  see  a  mighty  darkness 
Filling  the  seat  of  power,  and  rays  of  gloom 
Dart  round,  as  light  from  the  meridian  sun, 
Ungazed  upon  and  shapeless  ;  neither  limb, 
Nor  form,  nor  outline ;  yet  we  feel  it  is 
A  living  Spirit. 

DEMOGORGON. 
Ask  what  thou  wouldst  know.  410 

ASIA. 
What  canst  thou  tell? 

DEMOGORGON. 
All  things  thou  dar'st  demand. 


64  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

ASIA. 
Who  made  the  living  world  ? 

DEMOGORGON. 
God. 

ASIA. 

Who  made  all 

That  it  contains  ?  thought,  passion,  reason,  will, 
Imagination  ? 

DEMOGORGON. 
God :  Almighty  God. 

ASIA. 

Who  made  that  sense  which,  when  the  winds  of  spring 
In  rarest  visitation,  or  the  voice 
Of  one  beloved  heard  in  youth  alone, 
Fills  the  faint  eyes  with  falling  tears  which  dim 
The  radiant  looks  of  unbewailing  flowers, 
And  leaves  this  peopled  earth  a  solitude  420 

When  it  returns  no  more  ? 

DEMOGORGON. 

Merciful  God. 
ASIA. 

And  who  made  terror,  madness,  crime,  remorse, 
Which  from  the  links  of  the  great  chain  of  things, 
To  every  thought  within  the  mind  of  man 
Sway  and  drag  heavily,  and  each  one  reels 
Under  the  load  towards  the  pit  of  death ; 
Abandoned  hope,  and  love  that  turns  to  hate ; 


SCENE  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  65 

And  self-contempt,  bitterer  to  drink  than  blood ; 

Pain,  whose  unheeded  and  familiar  speech 

Is  howling,  and  keen  shrieks,  day  after  day ;  430 

And  Hell,  or  the  sharp  fear  of  Hell  ? 

DEMOGORGON. 

He  reigns. 

ASIA. 

Utter  his  name :  a  world  pining  in  pain 
Asks  but  his  name  :  curses  shall  drag  him  down. 

DEMOGORGON. 

He  reigns. 
ASIA. 
I  feel,  I  know  it :  who  ? 

DEMOGORGON. 

He  reigns. 

ASIA. 

Who  reigns?    There  was  the  Heaven  and  Earth  at  first, 
And  Light  and  Love ;  then  Saturn,  from  whose  throne 
Time  fell,  an  envious  shadow :  such  the  state 
Of  the  earth's  primal  spirits  beneath  his  sway, 
As  the  calm  joy  of  flowers  and  living  leaves 
Before  the  wind  or  sun  has  withered  them  440 

And  semivital  worms  ;  but  he  refused 
The  birthright  of  their  being,  knowledge,  power, 
The  skill  which  wields  the  elements,  the  thought 
Which  pierces  this  dim  universe  like  light, 
Self-empire,  and  the  majesty  of  love  ; 
For  thirst  of  which  they  fainted.     Then  Prometheus 


66  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

Gave  wisdom,  which  is  strength,  to  Jupiter, 

And,  with  this  law  alone,  '  Let  man  be  free,' 

Clothed  him  with  the  dominion  of  wide  Heaven. 

To  know  nor  faith,  nor  love,  nor  law ;  to  be  450 

Omnipotent  but  friendless  is  to  reign ; 

And  Jove  now  reigned ;  for  on  the  race  of  man 

First  famine,  and  then  toil,  and  then  disease, 

Strife,  wounds,  and  ghastly  death  unseen  before, 

Fell ;  and  the  unseasonable  seasons  drove 

With  alternating  shafts  of  frost  and  fire, 

Their  shelterless,  pale  tribes  to  mountain-caves  : 

And  in  their  desert  hearts  fierce  wants  he  sent, 

And  mad  disquietudes,  and  shadows  idle 

Of  unreal  good,  which  levied  mutual  war,  460 

So  ruining  the  lair  wherein  they  raged. 

Prometheus  saw,  and  waked  the  legioned  hopes 

Which  sleep  within  folded  Elysian  flowers, 

Nepenthe,  Moly,  Amaranth,  fadeless  blooms, 

That  they  might  hide  with  thin  and  rainbow  wings 

The  shape  of  Death  ;  and  Love  he  sent  to  bind 

The  disunited  tendrils  of  that  vine 

Which  bears  the  wine  of  life,  the  human  heart ; 

And  he  tamed  fire  which,  like  some  beast  of  prey, 

Most  terrible,  but  lovely,  played  beneath  470 

The  frown  of  man ;  and  tortured  to  his  will 

Iron  and  gold,  the  slaves  and  signs  of  power, 

And  gems  and  poisons,  and  all  subtlest  forms 

Hidden  beneath  the  mountains  and  the  waves. 

He  gave  man  speech,  and  speech  created  thought, 

Which  is  the  measure  of  the  universe ; 

And  science  struck  the  thrones  of  earth  and  heaven, 


SCENE  iv.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  67 

Which  shook,  but  fell  not ;  and  the  harmonious  mind 

Amred  itself  forth  in  all-prophetic  song ; 

And  music  lifted  up  the  listening  spirit  480 

Until  it  walked,  exempt  from  mortal  care, 

Godlike,  o'er  the  clear  billows  of  sweet  sound ; 

And  human  hands  first  mimicked  and  then  mocked, 

With  moulded  limbs  more  lovely  than  its  own, 

The  human  form,  till  marble  grew  divine ; 

And  mothers,  gazing,  drank  the  love  men  see 

Reflected  in  their  race,  behold,  and  perish. 

He  told  the  hidden  power  of  herbs  and  springs, 

And  Disease  drank  and  slept.     Death  grew  like  sleep. 

He  taught  the  implicated  orbits  woven  490 

Of  the  wide-wandering  stars ;  and  how  the  sun 

Changes  his  lair,  and  by  what  secret  spell 

The  pale  moon  is  transformed,  when  her  broad  eye 

Gazes  not  on  the  interlunar  sea  : 

He  taught  to  rule,  as  life  directs  the  limbs, 

The  tempest-winged  chariots  of  the  Ocean, 

And  the  Celt  knew  the  Indian.     Cities  then 

Were  built,  and  through  their  snow-like  columns  flowed 

The  warm  winds,  and  the  azure  aether  shone, 

And  the  blue  sea  and  shadowy  hills  were  seen.  500 

Such,  the  alleviations  of  his  state, 

Prometheus  gave  to  man,  for  which  he  hangs 

Withering  in  destined  pain  :  but  who  rains  down 

Evil,  the  immedicable  plague,  which,  while 

Man  looks  on  his  creation  like  a  God 

And  sees  that  it  is  glorious,  drives  him  on 

The  wreck  of  his  own  will,  the  scorn  of  earth, 

The  outcast,  the  abandoned,  the  alone? 


68  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

Not  Jove  :  while  yet  his  frown  shook  heaven,  aye,  when 
His  adversary  from  adamantine  chains  510 

Cursed  him,  he  trembled  like  a  slave.     Declare 
Who  is  his  master  ?     Is  he  too  a  slave  ? 

DEMOGORGON. 

All  spirits  are  enslaved  which  serve  things  evil : 
Thou  knowest  if  Jupiter  be  such  or  no. 

ASIA. 
Whom  called'st  thou  God? 

DEMOGORGON. 

I  spoke  but  as  ye  speak, 
For  Jove  is  the  supreme  of  living  things. 

ASIA. 
Who  is  master  of  the  slave  ? 

DEMOGORGON. 

If  the  abysm 

Could  vomit  forth  his  secrets  .  .  .    But  a  voice 
Is  wanting,  the  deep  truth  is  im  ageless  ; 
For  what  would  it  avail  to  bid  thee  gaze  520 

On  the  revolving  world?     What  to  bid  speak 
Fate,  Time,  Occasion,  Chance  and  Change?    To  these 
All  things  are  subject  but  eternal  Love. 

ASIA. 

So  much  I  asked  before,  and  my  heart  gave 

The  response  thou  hast  given ;  and  of  such  truths 


SCENE  iv.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  69 

Each  to  itself  must  be  the  oracle. 

One  more  demand  ;  and  do  thou  answer  me 

As  my  own  soul  would  answer,  did  it  know 

That  which  I  ask.     Prometheus  shall  arise 

Henceforth  the  sun  of  this  rejoicing  world  :  530 

When  shall  the  destined  hour  arrive  ? 

DEMOGORGON. 

Behold  ! 

ASIA. 

The  rocks  are  cloven,  and  through  the  purple  night 

I  see  cars  drawn  by  rainbow -winged  steeds 

Which  trample  the  dim  winds  :  in  each  there  stands 

A  wild-eyed  charioteer  urging  their  flight. 

Some  look  behind,  as  fiends  pursued  them  there, 

And  yet  I  see  no  shapes  but  the  keen  stars : 

Others,  with  burning  eyes,  lean  forth,  and  drink 

With  eager  lips  the  wind  of  their  own  speed, 

As  if  the  thing  they  loved  fled  on  before,  540 

And  now,  even  now,  they  clasped  it.    Their  bright  locks 

Stream  like  a  comet's  flashing  hair  :  they  all 

Sweep  onward. 

DEMOGORGON. 

These  are  the  immortal  Hours, 
Of  whom  thou  didst  demand.     One  waits  for  thee. 

ASIA. 

A  spirit  with  a  dreadful  countenance 

Checks  its  dark  chariot  by  the  craggy  gulph. 

Unlike  thy  brethren,  ghastly  charioteer, 

Who  art  thou  ?    Whither  wouldst  thou  bear  me  ?    Speak  ! 


70  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

SPIRIT. 

I  am  the  shadow  of  a  destiny 

More  dread  than  is  my  aspect :  ere  yon  planet  550 

Has  set,  the  darkness  which  ascends  with  me 
Shall  wrap  in  lasting  night  heaven's  kingless  throne. 

ASIA. 
What  meanest  thou? 

PANTHEA. 

That  terrible  shadow  floats 
Up  from  its  throne,  as  may  the  lurid  smoke 
Of  earthquake-ruined  cities  o'er  the  sea. 
Lo  !  it  ascends  the  car ;  the  coursers  fly 
Terrified :  watch  its  path  among  the  stars 
Blackening  the  night ! 

ASIA. 
Thus  I  am  answered  :  strange  ! 

PANTHEA. 

See,  near  the  verge,  another  chariot  stays ; 
An  ivory  shell  inlaid  with  crimson  fire,  560 

Which  comes  and  goes  within  its  sculptured  rim 
Of  delicate  strange  tracery ;  the  young  spirit 
That  guides  it  has  the  dove-like  eyes  of  hope ; 
How  its  soft  smiles  attract  the  soul !  as  light 
Lures  winged  insects  through  the  lampless  air. 

SPIRIT. 

My  coursers  are  fed  with  the  lightning, 
They  drink  of  the  whirlwind's  stream, 
And  when  the  red  morning  is  bright'ning 


SCENE  v.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  71 

They  bathe  in  the  fresh  sunbeam ; 
They  have  strength  for  their  swiftness  I  deem,        570 
Then  ascend  with  me,  daughter  of  Ocean. 

I  desire  :  and  their  speed  makes  night  kindle ; 
I  fear  :  they  outstrip  the  Typhoon ; 

Ere  the  cloud  piled  on  Atlas  can  dwindle 
We  encircle  the  earth  and  the  moon : 
We  shall  rest  from  long  labours  at  noon : 

Then  ascend  with  me,  daughter  of  Ocean. 


SCENE  V.  —  TJie  Car  pauses  within  a  Cloud  on  the  Top  of  a 
snowy  Mountain.  ASIA,  PANTHEA,  and  the  SPIRIT  OF  THE 
HOUR. 

SPIRIT. 
On  the  brink  of  the  night  and  the  morning 

My  coursers  are  wont  to  respire ; 

But  the  Earth  has  just  whispered  a  warning  580 

That  their  flight  must  be  swifter  than  fire  : 
They  shall  drink  the  hot  speed  of  desire  ! 

ASIA. 

Thou  breathest  on  their  nostrils,  but  my  breath 
Would  give  them  swifter  speed. 

SPIRIT. 

Alas  !  it  could  not. 

PANTHEA. 

Oh  Spirit !  pause,  and  tell  whence  is  the  light 
Which  fills  the  cloud  ?    The  sun  is  yet  unrisen. 


72  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

SPIRIT. 

The  sun  will  rise  not  until  noon.     Apollo 

Is  held  in  heaven  by  wonder ;  and  the  light 

Which  fills  this  vapour,  as  the  aerial  hue 

Of  fountain-gazing  roses  fills  the  water,  590 

Flows  from  thy  mighty  sister. 

PANTHEA. 

Yes,  I  feel  — 
ASIA. 
What  is  it  with  thee,  sister  ?    Thou  art  pale. 

PANTHEA. 

How  thou  art  changed  !     I  dare  not  look  on  thee ; 

I  feel  but  see  thee  not.     I  scarce  endure 

The  radiance  of  thy  beauty.     Some  good  change 

Is  working  in  the  elements,  which  suffer 

Thy  presence  thus  unveiled.     The  Nereids  tell 

That  on  the  day  when  the  clear  hyaline 

Was  cloven  at  thy  uprise,  and  thou  didst  stand 

Within  a  veined  shell,  which  floated  on  600 

Over  the  calm  floor  of  the  crystal  sea, 

Among  the  yEgean  isles,  and  by  the  shores 

Which  bear  thy  name  ;  love,  like  the  atmosphere 

Of  the  sun's  fire  filling  the  living  world, 

Burst  from  thee,  and  illumined  earth  and  heaven 

And  the  deep  ocean  and  the  sunless  caves 

And  all  that  dwells  within  them  ;  till  grief  cast 

Eclipse  upon  the  soul  from  which  it  came  : 

Such  art  thou  now ;  nor  is  it  I  alone, 


SCENE  v.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  73 

Thy  sister,  thy  companion,  thine  own  chosen  one,  610 

But  the  whole  world  which  seeks  thy  sympathy. 

Hear'st  thou  not  sounds  i'  the  air  which  speak  the  love 

Of  all  articulate  beings  ?     Feel'st  thou  not 

The  inanimate  winds  enamoured  of  thee  ?     List ! 

[Music. 
ASIA. 

Thy  words  are  sweeter  than  aught  else  but  his 
Whose  echoes  they  are  :  yet  all  love  is  sweet, 
Given  or  returned.     Common  as  light  is  love, 
And  its  familiar  voice  wearies  not  ever. 
Like  the  wide  heaven,  the  all- sustaining  air, 
It  makes  the  reptile  equal  to  the  God :  620 

They  who  inspire  it  most  are  fortunate, 
As  I  am  now ;  but  those  who  feel  it  most 
Are  happier  still,  after  long  sufferings, 
As  I  shall  soon  become. 

PANTHEA. 
List !     Spirits  speak. 

VOICE   in  the  Air,  singing. 

Life  of  Life  !  thy  lips  enkindle 

With  their  love  the  breath  between  them ; 

And  thy  smiles  before  they  dwindle 

Make  the  cold  air  fire ;  then  screen  them 

In  those  looks,  where  whoso  gazes 

Faints,  entangled  in  their  mazes.  630 

Child  of  Light !  thy  limbs  are  burning 

Thro'  the  vest  which  seems  to  hide  them ; 
As  the  radiant  lines  of  morning 


74  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

Thro"  the  clouds  ere  they  divide  them ; 
And  this  atmosphere  divinest 
Shrouds  thee  wheresoe'er  thou  shinest. 

Fair  are  others ;  none  beholds  thee, 
But  thy  voice  sounds  low  and  tender 

Like  the  fairest,  for  it  folds  thee 

From  the  sight,  that  liquid  splendour,  640 

And  all  feel,  yet  see  thee  never, 

As  I  feel  now,  lost  for  ever  ! 

Lamp  of  Earth  !  where'er  thou  movest 
Its  dim  shapes  are  clad  with  brightness, 

And  the  souls  of  whom  thou  lovest 
Walk  upon  the  winds  with  lightness, 

Till  they  fail,  as  I  am  failing, 

Dizzy,  lost,  yet  unbewailing  ! 

ASIA. 

My  soul  is  an  enchanted  boat, 

Which,  like  a  sleeping  swan,  doth  float  650 

Upon  the  silver  waves  of  thy  sweet  singing ; 

And  thine  doth  like  an  angel  sit 

Beside  the  helm  conducting  it, 
Whilst  all  the  winds  with  melody  are  ringing. 

It  seems  to  float  ever,  for  ever, 

Upon  that  many-winding  river, 

Between  mountains,  woods,  abysses, 

A  paradise  of  wildernesses  ! 
Till,  like  one  in  slumber  bound, 
Borne  to  the  ocean,  I  float  down,  around,  660 

Into  a  sea  profound,  of  ever-spreading  sound  : 


SCENE  v.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  75 

Meanwhile  thy  spirit  lifts  its  pinions 

In  music's  most  serene  dominions  ; 
Catching  the  winds  that  fan  that  happy  heaven. 

And  we  sail  on,  away,  afar, 

Without  a  course,  without  a  star, 
But,  by  the  instinct  of  sweet  music  driven ; 

Till  through  Elysian  garden  islets 

By  thee,  most  beautiful  of  pilots, 

Where  never  mortal  pinnace  glided,  670 

The  boat  of  my  desire  is  guided  : 
Realms  where  the  air  we  breathe  is  love, 
Which  in  the  winds  and  on  the  waves  doth  move, 
Harmonizing  this  earth  with  what  we  feel  above. 

We  have  past  Age's  icy  caves, 

And  Manhood's  dark  and  tossing  waves, 
And  Youth's  smooth  ocean,  smiling  to  betray : 

Beyond  the  glassy  gulphs  we  flee 

Of  shadow-peopled  Infancy, 
Through  Death  and  Birth,  to  a  diviner  day :  680 

A  paradise  of  vaulted  bowers, 

Lit  by  downward-gazing  flowers, 

And  watery  paths  that  wind  between 

Wildernesses  calm  and  green, 
Peopled  by  shapes  too  bright  to  see, 
And  rest,  having  beheld ;  somewhat  like  thee ; 
Which  walk  upon  the  sea,  and  chaunt  melodiously  ! 


ACT   III. 

SCENE  I. — Heaven.    JUPITER  on  his  Throne;  THETIS  and 
the  other  Deities  assembled. 

JUPITER. 

Ye  congregated  powers  of  heaven,  who  share 
The  glory  and  the  strength  of  him  ye  serve, 
Rejoice  !  henceforth  I  am  omnipotent. 
All  else  had  been  subdued  to  me ;  alone 
The  soul  of  man,  like  unextinguished  fire, 
Yet  burns  towards  heaven  with  fierce  reproach,  and  doubt, 
And  lamentation,  and  reluctant  prayer, 
Hurling  up  insurrection,  which  might  make 
Our  antique  empire  insecure,  though  built 
On  eldest  faith,  and  hell's  coeval,  fear ;  10 

And  tho'  my  curses  thro'  the  pendulous  air, 
Like  snow  on  herbless  peaks,  fall  flake  by  flake, 
And  cling  to  it ;  tho'  under  my  wrath's  might 
It  climb  the  crags  of  life,  step  after  step, 
Which  wound  it,  as  ice  wounds  unsandalled  feet, 
It  yet  remains  supreme  o'er  misery, 
Aspiring,  unrepressed,  yet  soon  to  fall : 
Even  now  have  I  begotten  a  strange  wonder, 
That  fatal  child,  the  terror  of  the  earth, 
Who  waits  but  till  the  destined  hour  arrive,  20 

76 


[SCENE  i.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  77 

Bearing  from  Demogorgon's  vacant  throne 
The  dreadful  might  of  ever-living  limbs 
Which  clothed  that  awful  spirit  unbeheld 
To  redescend,  and  trample  out  the  spark. 

Pour  forth  heaven's  wine,  Idaen  Ganymede, 

And  let  it  fill  the  Daedal  cups  like  fire, 

And  from  the  flower-inwoven  soil  divine 

Ye  all-triumphant  harmonies  arise, 

As  dew  from  earth  under  the  twilight  stars  : 

Drink  !  be  the  nectar  circling  thro'  your  veins  30 

The  soul  of  joy,  ye  ever- living  Gods, 

Till  exultation  burst  in  one  wide  voice 

Like  music  from  Elysian  winds. 

And  thou 

Ascend  beside  me,  veiled  in  the  light 
Of  the  desire  which  makes  thee  one  with  me, 
Thetis,  bright  image  of  eternity  ! 
When  thou  didst  cry,  "  Insufferable  might ! 
God  !  spare  me  !  I  sustain  not  the  quick  flames, 
The  penetrating  presence ;  all  my  being, 
Like  him  whom  the  Numidian  seps  did  thaw  40 

Into  a  dew  with  poison,  is  dissolved, 
Sinking  thro'  its  foundations  :  "  even  then 
Two  mighty  spirits,  mingling,  made  a  third 
Mightier  than  either,  which,  unbodied  now, 
Between  us  floats,  felt,  although  unbeheld, 
Waiting  the  incarnation,  which  ascends 
(Hear  ye  the  thunder  of  the  fiery  wheels 
Griding  the  winds  ?)  from  Demogorgon's  throne.  «w 

Victory  !  victory  !     Feel'st  thou  not,  O  world, 


78  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  m. 

The  earthquake  of  his  chariot  thundering  up  50 

Olympus  ? 

\_The  Car  of  the  HOUR  arrives.  DEMOGORGON  de- 
scends, and  moves  towards  the  Throne  #/"  JUPITER. 
Awful  shape,  what  art  thou?  Speak  ! 

DEMOGORGON. 

Eternity.     Demand  no  direr  name. 

Descend,  and  follow  me  down  the  abyss. 

I  am  thy  child,  as  thou  wert  Saturn's  child ; 

Mightier  than  thee  :  and  we  must  dwell  together 

Henceforth  in  darkness.     Lift  thy  lightnings  not. 

The  tyranny  of  heaven  none  may  retain, 

Or  reassume,  or  hold,  succeeding  thee  : 

Yet  if  thou  wilt,  as  'tis  the  destiny 

Of  trodden  worms  to  writhe  till  they  are  dead,  60 

Put  forth  thy  might. 

JUPITER. 

Detested  prodigy ! 

Even  thus  beneath  the  deep  Titanian  prisons 
I  trample  thee  !  thou  lingerest? 

Mercy !  mercy ! 

No  pity,  no  release,  no  respite  !     Oh, 
That  thou  wouldst  make  mine  enemy  my  judge, 
Even  where  he  hangs,  seared  by  my  long  revenge, 
On  Caucasus  !  he  would  not  doom  me  thus. 
Gentle,  and  just,  and  dreadless,  is  he  not 
The  monarch  of  the  world  ?     What  then  art  thou  ? 
No  refuge  !  no  appeal ! 

Sink  with  me  then,  70 


SCENE  II. J  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  79 

We  two  will  sink  on  the  wide  waves  of  ruin, 

Even  as  a  vulture  and  a  snake  outspent  - 

Drop,  twisted  in  inextricable  fight, 

Into  a  shoreless  sea.     Let  hell  unlock 

Its  mounded  oceans  of  tempestuous  fire, 

And  whelm  on  them  into  the  bottomless  void 

This  desolated  world,  and  thee,  and  me, 

The  conqueror  and  the  conquered,  and  the  wreck 

Of  that  for  which  they  combated  ! 

Ai !  Ai ! 

The  elements  obey  me  not.     I  sink  80 

Dizzily  down,  ever,  for  ever,  down. 
And,  like  a  cloud,  mine  enemy  above 
Darkens  my  fall  with  victory  !     Ai,  Ai ! 


SCENE  II.  —  The  Mouth  of  a  great  River  in  the  Island 
Atlantis.  OCEAN  is  discovered  reclining  near  the  Shore; 
APOLLO  stands  beside  him. 

OCEAN. 
He  fell,  thou  sayest,  beneath  his  conqueror's  frown  ? 

APOLLO. 

Aye,  when  the  strife  was  ended  which  made  dim 
The  orb  I  rule,  and  shook  the  solid  stars, 
The  terrors  of  his  eye  illumined  heaven 
With  sanguine  light,  through  the  thick  ragged  skirts 
Of  the  victorious  darkness,  as  he  fell : 

Like  the  last  glare  of  day's  red  agony,  90 

Which,  from  a  rent  among  the  fiery  clouds, 
Burns  far  along  the  tempest-wrinkled  deep. 


80  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  in. 

OCEAN. 
He  sunk  to  the  abyss  ?    To  the  dark  void  ? 

APOLLO. 

An  eagle  so  caught  in  some  bursting  cloud 

On  Caucasus,  his  thunder-baffled  wings 

Entangled  in  the  whirlwind,  and  his  eyes 

Which  gazed  on  the  undazzling  sun,  now  blinded 

By  the  white  lightning,  while  the  ponderous  hail 

Beats  on  his  struggling  form,  which  sinks  at  length 

Prone,  and  the  aerial  ice  clings  over  it.  too 

OCEAN. 

Henceforth  the  fields  of  Heaven-reflecting  sea 

Which  are  my  realm,  will  heave,  unstained  with  blood, 

Beneath  the  uplifting  winds,  like  plains  of  corn 

Swayed  by  the  summer  air ;  my  streams  will  flow 

Round  many-peopled  continents,  and  round 

Fortunate  isles  ;  and  from  their  glassy  thrones 

Blue  Proteus  and  his  humid  nymphs  shall  mark 

The  shadow  of  fair  ships,  as  mortals  see 

The  floating  bark  of  the  light-laden  moon 

With  that  white  star,  its  sightless  pilot's  crest,  no 

Borne  down  the  rapid  sunset's  ebbing  sea ; 

Tracking  their  path  no  more  by  blood  and  groans, 

And  desolation,  and  the  mingled  voice 

Of  slavery  and  command ;  but  by  the  light 

Of  wave-reflected  flowers,  and  floating  odours, 

And  music  soft,  and  mild,  free,  gentle  voices, 

And  sweetest  music,  such  as  spirits  love. 


SCENE  ii.J  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  81 

APOLLO. 

And  I  shall  gaze  not  on  the  deeds  which  make 

My  mind  obscure  with  sorrow,  as  eclipse 

Darkens  the  sphere  I  guide  ;  but  list,  I  hear  120 

The  small,  clear,  silver  lute  of  the  young  Spirit 

That  sits  i'  the  morning  star. 

OCEAN. 

Thou  must  away ; 

Thy  steeds  will  pause  at  even,  till  when  farewell : 
The  loud  deep  calls  me  home  even  now  to  feed  it 
With  azure  calm  out  of  the  emerald  urns 
Which  stand  for  ever  full  beside  my  throne. 
Behold  the  Nereids  under  the  green  sea, 
Their  wavering  limbs  borne  on  the  wind-like  stream, 
Their  white  arms  lifted  o'er  their  streaming  hair 
With  garlands  pied  and  starry  sea- flower  crowns,  130 

Hastening  to  grace  their  mighty  sister's  joy. 

\_A  sound  of  waves  is  heard. 
It  is  the  unpastured  sea  hungering  for  calm. 
Peace,  monster ;  I  come  now.     Farewell. 

APOLLO. 

Farewell. 


82  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  in. 

SCENE  III. —  Caucasus.  PROMETHEUS,  HERCULES,  IONE,  the 
EARTH,  SPIRITS,  ASIA  and  PANTHEA,  borne  in  the  Car  with 
the  SPIRIT  OF  THE  HOUR. 

HERCULES  unbinds  PROMETHEUS,  who  descends. 

HERCULES. 

Most  glorious  among  spirits,  thus  doth  strength 
To  wisdom,  courage,  and  long-suffering  love, 
And  thee,  who  art  the  form  they  animate, 
Minister  like  a  slave. 

PROMETHEUS. 
Thy  gentle  words 

Are  sweeter  even  than  freedom  long  desired 
And  long  delayed. 

Asia,  thou  light  of  life, 

Shadow  of  beauty  unbeheld  :  and  ye,  140 

Fair  sister  nymphs,  who  made  long  years  of  pain 
Sweet  to  remember,  thro'  your  love  and  care : 
Henceforth  we  will  not  part.     There  is  a  cave, 
All  overgrown  with  trailing  odorous  plants, 
Which  curtain  out  the  day  with  leaves  and  flowers, 
And  paved  with  veined  emerald,  and  a  fountain 
Leaps  in  the  midst  with  an  awakening  sound. 
From  its  curved  roof  the  mountain's  frozen  tears 
Like  snow,  or  silver,  or  long  diamond  spires, 
Hang  downward,  raining  forth  a  doubtful  light :  150 

And  there  is  heard  the  ever-moving  air, 
Whispering  without  from  tree  to  tree,  and  birds, 
And  bees ;  and  all  around  are  mossy  seats, 
And  the  rough  walls  are  clothed  with  long  soft  grass ; 


SCENE  m.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  83 

A  simple  dwelling,  which  shall  be  our  own ; 

Where  we  will  sit  and  talk  of  time  and  change, 

As  the  world  ebbs  and  flows,  ourselves  unchanged. 

What  can  hide  man  from  mutability? 

And  if  ye  sigh,  then  I  will  smile ;  and  thou, 

lone,  shalt  chaunt  fragments  of  sea-music,  160 

Until  I  weep,  when  ye  shall  smile  away 

The  tears  she  brought,  which  yet  were  sweet  to  shed. 

We  will  entangle  buds  and  flowers  and  beams 

Which  twinkle  on  the  fountain's  brim,  and  make 

Strange  combinations  out  of  common  things, 

Like  human  babes  in  their  brief  innocence ; 

And  we  will  search,  with  looks  and  words  of  love, 

For  hidden  thoughts,  each  lovelier  than  the  last, 

Our  unexhausted  spirits ;  and  like  lutes 

Touched  by  the  skill  of  the  enamoured  wind,  170 

Weave  harmonies  divine,  yet  ever  new, 

From  difference  sweet  where  discord  cannot  be ; 

And  hither  come,  sped  on  the  charmed  winds, 

Which  meet  from  all  the  points  of  heaven,  as  bees 

From  every  flower  aerial  Enna  feeds, 

At  their  own  island-homes  in  Himera 

The  echoes  of  the  human  world,  which  tell 

Of  the  low  voice  of  love,  almost  unheard, 

And  dove-eyed  pity's  murmured  paja,  and  music, 

Itself  the  echo  of  the  heart,  and  all  180 

That  tempers  or  improves  man's  life,  now  free ; 

And  lovely  apparitions,  dim  at  first, 

Then  radiant,  as  the  mind,  arising  bright 

From  the  embrace  of  beauty,  whence  the  forms 

Of  which  these  are  the  phantoms,  casts  on  them 


84  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  in. 

The  gathered  rays  which  are  reality, 

Shall  visit  us,  the  progeny  immortal 

Of  Painting,  Sculpture,  and  rapt  Poesy, 

And  arts,  tho'  unimagined,  yet  to  be. 

The  wandering  voices  and  the  shadows  these  190 

Of  all  that  man  becomes,  the  mediators 

Of  that  best  worship  love,  by  him  and  us 

Given  and  returned  ;  swift  shapes  and  sounds,  which  grow 

More  fair  and  soft  as  man  grows  wise  and  kind, 

And,  veil  by  veil,  evil  and  error  fall : 

Such  virtue  has  the  cave  and  place  around. 

{Turning  to  the  SPIRIT  OF  THE  HOUR. 
For  thee,  fair  Spirit,  one  toil  remains.     lone, 
Give  her  that  curved  shell,  which  Proteus  old 
Made  Asia's  nuptial  boon,  breathing  within  it 
A  voice  to  be  accomplished,  and  which  thou  200 

Didst  hide  in  grass  under  the  hollow  rock. 

IONE. 

Thou  most  desired  Hour,  more  loved  and  lovely 
Than  all  thy  sisters,  this  is  the  mystic  shell ; 
See  the  pale  azure  fading  into  silver 
Lining  it  with  a  soft  yet  glowing  light : 
Looks  it  not  like  lulled  music  sleeping  there  ? 

SPIRIT. 

It  seems  in  truth  the  fairest  shell  of  Ocean : 
Its  sound  must  be  at  once  both  sweet  and  strange. 

PROMETHEUS. 

Go,  borne  over  the  cities  of  mankind 
On  whirlwind-footed  coursers  :  once  again  210 


SCENE  in.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  85 

Outspeed  the  sun  around  the  orbed  world ; 
And  as  thy  chariot  cleaves  the  kindling  air, 
Thou  breathe  into  the  many- folded  shell, 
Loosening  its  mighty  music  ;  it  shall  be 
As  thunder  mingled  with  clear  echoes  :  then 
Return ;  and  thou  shalt  dwell  beside  our  cave. 
And  thou,  O,  Mother  Earth  !  — 

THE  EARTH. 

I  hear,  I  feel ; 

Thy  lips  are  on  me,  and  thy  touch  runs  down 
Even  to  the  adamantine  central  gloom 

'Along  these  marble  nerves  ;  'tis  life,  'tis  joy,  aao 

And  thro'  my  withered,  old,  and  icy  frame 
The  warmth  of  an  immortal  youth  shoots  down 
Circling.     Henceforth  the  many  children  fair 
Folded  in  my  sustaining  arms ;  all  plants, 
And  creeping  forms,  and  insects  rainbow-winged, 
And  birds,  and  beasts,  and  fish,  and  human  shapes, 
Which  drew  disease  and  pain  from  my  wan  bosom, 
Draining  the  poison  of  despair,  shall  take 
And  interchange  sweet  nutriment.     To  me 
Shall  they  become  like  sister-antelopes  230 

By  one  fair  dam,  snow-white  and  swift  as  wind, 
Nursed  among  lilies  near  a  brimming  stream. 
The  dew-mists  of  my  sunless  sleep  shall  float 
Under  the  stars  like  balm  :  night-folded  flowers 
Shall  suck  unwithering  hues  in  their  repose  : 
And  men  and  beasts  in  happy  dreams  shall  gather 
Strength  for  the  coming  day,  and  all  its  joy :  * 
And  death  shall  be  the  last  embrace  of  her 


86  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  in. 

Who  takes  the  life  she  gave,  even  as  a  mother 

Folding  her  child,  says,  "  Leave  me  not  again."  240 

ASIA. 

Oh,  mother  !  wherefore  speak  the  name  of  death  ? 
Cease  they  to  love,  and  move,  and  breathe,  and  speak, 

Who  die? 

THE  EARTH. 

It  would  avail  not  to  reply  : 
Thou  art  immortal,  and  this  tongue  is  known 
But  to  the  uncommunicating  dead. 
Death  is  the  veil  which  those  who  live  call  life  : 
They  sleep,  and  it  is  lifted  :  and  meanwhile 
In  mild  variety  the  seasons  mild 
With  rainbow-skirted  showers,  and  odorous  winds, 
And  long  blue  meteors  cleansing  the  dull  night,  250 

And  the  life-kindling  shafts  of  the  keen  sun's 
All-piercing  bow,  and  the  dew-mingled  rain 
Of  the  calm  moonbeams,  a  soft  influence  mild, 
Shall  clothe  the  forests  and  the  fields,  aye,  even 
The  crag-built  desarts  of  the  barren  deep, 
With  ever-living  leaves,  and  fruits,  and  flowers. 
And  thou  !     There  is  a  cavern  where  my  spirit 
Was  panted  forth  in  anguish  whilst  thy  pain 
Made  my  heart  mad,  and  those  who  did  inhale  it 
Became  mad  too,  and  built  a  temple  there,  260 

And  spoke,  and  were  oracular,  and  lured 
The  erring  nations  round  to  mutual  war, 
And  faithless  faith,  such  as  Jove  kept  with  thee ; 
Which  breath  now  rises,  as  amongst  tall  weeds 
A  violet's  exhalation,  and  it  fills 


SCENE  m.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  87 

With  a  serener  light  and  crimson  air, 

Intense,  yet  soft,  the  rocks  and  woods  around ; 

It  feeds  the  quick  growth  of  the  serpent  vine, 

And  the  dark  linked  ivy  tangling  wild, 

And  budding,  blown,  or  odour-faded  blooms  270 

Which  star  the  winds  with  points  of  coloured  light, 

As  they  rain  thro'  them,  and  bright  golden  globes 

Of  fruit,  suspended  in  their  own  green  heaven, 

And  thro'  their  veined  leaves  and  amber  stems 

The  flowers  whose  purple  and  translucent  bowls 

Stand  ever  mantling  with  aerial  dew, 

The  drink  of  spirits  :  and  it  circles  round, 

Like  the  soft  waving  wings  of  noonday  dreams, 

Inspiring  calm  and  happy  thoughts,  like  mine, 

Now  thou  art  thus  restored.     This  cave  is  thine.  280 

Arise  !     Appear  ! 

\A  Spirit  rises  in  the  likeness  of  a  winged  child. 

This  is  my  torch-bearer ; 
Who  let  his  lamp  out  in  old  time  with  gazing 
On  eyes  from  which  he  kindled  it  anew 
With  love,  which  is  as  fire,  sweet  daughter  mine, 
For  such  is  that  within  thine  own.     Run,  wayward, 
And  guide  this  company  beyond  the  peak 
Of  Bacchic  Nysa,  Maenad-haunted  mountain, 
And  beyond  Indus  and  its  tribute  rivers, 
Trampling  the  torrent  streams  and  glassy  lakes 
With  feet  unwet,  unwearied,  undelaying,  290 

And  up  the  green  ravine,  across  the  vale, 
Beside  the  windless  and  crystalline  pool 
Where  ever  lies,  on  unerasing  waves, 
The  image  of  a  temple,  built  above, 


88  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  HI. 

Distinct  with  column,  arch,  and  architrave, 

And  palm-like  capital,  and  over-wrought, 

And  populous  most  with  living  imagery, 

Praxitelean  shapes,  whose  marble  smiles 

Fill  the  hushed  air  with  everlasting  love. 

It  is  deserted  now,  but  once  it  bore  300 

Thy  name,  Prometheus  ;  there  the  emulous  youths 

Bore  to  thy  honour  thro'  the  divine  gloom 

The  lamp  which  was  thine  emblem  ;  even  as  those 

Who  bear  the  untransmitted  torch  of  hope 

Into  the  grave,  across  the  night  of  life, 

As  thou  hast  borne  it  most  triumphantly 

To  this  far  goal  of  Time.     Depart,  farewell. 

Beside  that  temple  is  the  destined  cave. 

SCENE  IV.  —  A  Forest.     In  the  Background  a  Cave.     PRO- 
METHEUS, ASIA,  PANTHEA,  IONE,  and  the  SPIRIT  OF  THE 

EARTH. 

TONE. 

Sister,  it  is  not  earthly  :  how  it  glides 

Under  the  leaves  !  how  on  its  head  there  burns  310 

A  light  like  a  green  star,  whose  emerald  beams 

Are  twined  with  its  fair  hair  !  how,  as  it  moves, 

The  splendour  drops  in  flakes  upon  the  grass  ! 

Knowest  thou  it? 

PANTHEA. 

It  is  the  delicate  spirit 

That  guides  the  earth  thro'  heaven.     From  afar 
The  populous  constellations  call  that  light 
The  loveliest  of  the  planets ;  and  sometimes 


SCENE  iv.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  89 

It  floats  along  the  spray  of  the  salt  sea, 

Or  makes  its  chariot  of  a  foggy  cloud, 

Or  walks  thro'  fields  or  cities  while  men  sleep,  320 

Or  o'er  the  mountain-tops,  or  down  the  rivers, 

Or  through  the  green  waste  wilderness,  as  now, 

Wondering  at  all  it  sees.     Before  Jove  reigned 

It  loved  our  sister  Asia,  and  it  came 

Each  leisure  hour  to  drink  the  liquid  light 

Out  of  her  eyes,  for  which  it  said  it  thirsted 

As  one  bit  by  a  dipsas,  and  with  her 

It  made  its  childish  confidence,  and  told  her 

All  it  had  known  or  seen,  for  it  saw  much, 

Yet  idly  reasoned  what  it  saw ;  and  called  her,  330 

For  whence  it  sprung  it  knew  not,  nor  do  I, 

Mother,  dear  mother. 

THE  SPIRIT  OF  THE  EARTH  (running  to  Asia). 

Mother,  dearest  mother ; 
May  I  then  talk  with  thee  as  I  was  wont  ? 
May  I  then  hide  my  eyes  in  thy  soft  arms, 
After  thy  looks  have  made  them  tired  of  joy? 
May  I  then  play  beside  thee  the  long  noons, 
When  work  is  none  in  the  bright  silent  air? 

ASIA. 

I  love  thee,  gentlest  being,  and  henceforth 
Can  cherish  thee  unenvied  :  speak,  I  pray : 
Thy  simple  talk  once  solaced,  now  delights.  340 

SPIRIT  OF  THE  EARTH.  ^ , 

Mother,  I  am  grown  wiser,  though  a  child 
Cannot  be  wise  like  thee,  within  this  day ; 


90  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  in. 

And  happier  too  ;  happier  and  wiser  both. 

Thou  knowest  that  toads,  and  snakes,  and  loathly  worms, 

And  venomous  and  malicious  beasts,  and  boughs 

That  bore  ill  berries  in  the  woods,  were  ever 

An  hindrance  to  my  walks  o'er  the  green  world  : 

And  that,  among  the  haunts  of  humankind, 

Hard-featured  men,  or  with  proud,  angry  looks, 

Or  cold,  staid  gait,  or  false  and  hollow  smiles,  350 

Or  the  dull  sneer  of  self-loved  ignorance, 

Or  other  such  foul  masks,  with  which  ill  thoughts 

Hide  that  fair  being  whom  we  spirits  call  man ; 

And  women  too,  ugliest  of  all  things  evil, 

(Tho'  fair,  even  in  a  world  where  thou  art  fair, 

When  good  and  kind,  free  and  sincere  like  thee,) 

When  false  or  frowning  made  me  sick  at  heart 

To  pass  them,  tho'  they  slept,  and  I  unseen. 

Well,  my  path  lately  lay  thro'  a  great  city 

Into  the  woody  hills  surrounding  it :  360 

A  sentinel  was  sleeping  at  the  gate  : 

When  there  was  heard  a  sound,  so  loud,  it  shook 

The  towers  amid  the  moonlight,  yet  more  sweet 

Than  any  voice  but  thine,  sweetest  of  all ; 

A  long,  long  sound,  as  it  would  never  end  : 

And  all  the  inhabitants  leapt  suddenly 

Out  of  their  rest,  and  gathered  in  the  streets, 

Looking  in  wonder  up  to  Heaven,  while  yet 

The  music  pealed  along.     I  hid  myself 

Within  a  fountain  in  the  public  square,  370 

Where  I  lay  like  the  reflex  of  the  moon 

Seen  in  a  wave  under  green  leaves ;  and  soon 

Those  ugly  human  shapes  and  visages 


SCENE  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  91 

Of  which  I  spoke  as  having  wrought  me  pain, 

Past  floating  thro'  the  air,  and  fading  still 

Into  the  winds  that  scattered  them ;  and  those 

From  whom  they  past  seemed  mild  and  lovely  forms      ^ 

After  some  foul  disguise  had  fallen,  and  all 

Were  somewhat  changed,  and  after  brief  surprise 

And  greetings  of  delighted  wonder,  all  380 

Went  to  their  sleep  again :  and  when  the  dawn 

Came,  would 'st  thou  think  that  toads,  and  snakes,  and 

efts, 

Could  e'er  be  beautiful?  yet  so  they  were, 
And  that  with  little  change  of  shape  or  hue  : 
All  things  had  put  their  evil  nature  off: 
I  cannot  tell  my  joy,  when  o'er  a  lake 
Upon  a  drooping  bough  with  night-shade  twined, 
I  saw  two  azure  halcyons  clinging  downward 
And  thinning  one  bright  bunch  of  amber  berries, 
With  quick  long  beaks,  and  in  the  deep  there  lay  390 

Those  lovely  forms  imaged  as  in  a  sky ; 
So  with  my  thoughts  full  of  these  happy  changes, 
We  meet  again,  the  happiest  change  of  all. 

ASIA. 

And  never  will  we  part,  till  thy  chaste  sister 
Who  guides  the  frozen  and  inconstant  moon 
Will  look  on  thy  more  warm  and  equal  light 
Till  her  heart  thaw  like  flakes  of  April  snow 
And  love  thee. 

SPIRIT  OF  THE  EARTH. 
What ;  as  Asia  loves  Prometheus  ?          ^ 


92  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND.  [ACT  m. 

ASIA. 

Peace,  wanton,  thou  art  yet  not  old  enough. 
Think  ye  by  gazing  on  each  other's  eyes  400 

To  multiply  your  lovely  selves,  and  fill 
With  sphered  fires  the  interlunar  air? 

SPIRIT  OF  THE  EARTH. 
Nay,  mother,  while  my.  sister  trims  her  lamp 
'Tis  hard  I  should  go  darkling. 

ASIA. 

Listen ;  look ! 
.    \The  SPIRIT  OF  THE  HOUR  enters. 

PROMETHEUS. 
We  feel  what  thou  hast  heard  and  seen  :  yet  speak. 

SPIRIT  OF  THE  HOUR. 

Soon  as  the  sound  had  ceased  whose  thunder  filled 
The  abysses  of  the  sky  and  the  wide  earth, 
There  was  a  change  :  the  impalpable  thin  air 
And  the  all-circling  sunlight  were  transformed, 
As  if  the  sense  of  love  dissolved  in  them  4IO 

Had  folded  itself  round  the  sphered  world. 
My  vision  then  grew  clear,  and  I  could  see 
Into  the  mysteries  of  the  universe  : 
Dizzy  as  with  delight  I  floated  down, 
Winnowing  the  lightsome  air  with  languid  plumes, 
My  coursers  sought  their  birthplace  in  the  sun, 
Where  they  henceforth  will  live  exempt  from  toil 
Pasturing  flowers  of  vegetable  fire. 
And  where  my  moonlike  car  will  stand  within 


SCENE  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  93 

A  temple,  gazed  upon  by  Phidian  forms  420 

Of  thee,  and  Asia,  and  the  Earth,  and  me, 

And  you  fair  nymphs  looking  the  love  we  feel ; 

In  memory  of  the  tidings  it  has  borne ; 

Beneath  a  dome  fretted  with  graven  flowers, 

Poised  on  twelve  columns  of  resplendent  stone, 

And  open  to  the  bright  and  liquid  sky. 

Yoked  to  it  by  an  amphisbenic  snake 

The  likeness  of  those  winged  steeds  will  mock 

The  flight  from  which  they  find  repose.     Alas, 

Whither  has  wandered  now  my  partial  tongue  430 

When  all  remains  untold  which  ye  would  hear? 

As  I  have  said  I  floated  to  the  earth : 

It  was,  as  it  is  still,  the  pain  of  bliss 

To  move,  to  breathe,  to  be ;  I  wandering  went 

Among  the  haunts  and  dwellings  of  mankind, 

And  first  was  disappointed  not  to  see 

Such  mighty  change  as  I  had  felt  within, 

Expressed  in  outward  things ;  but  soon  I  looked, 

And  behold,  thrones  were  kingless,  and  men  walked 

One  with  the  other  even  as  spirits  do,  440 

None  fawned,  none  trampled ;  hate,  disdain,  or  fear, 

Self-love  or  self-contempt,  on  human  brows 

No  more  inscribed,  as  o'er  the  gate  of  hell, 

"  All  hope  abandon  ye  who  enter  here ;  " 

None  frowned,  none  trembled,  none  with  eager  fear 

Gazed  on  another's  eye  of  cold  command, 

Until  the  subject  of  a  tyrant's  will 

Became,  worse  fate,  the  abject  of  his  own, 

Which  spurred  him,  like  an  outspent  horse,  to  death. 

None  wrought  his  lips  in  truth-entangling  lines  #o 


94  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  in. 

Which  smiled  the  lie  his  tongue  disdained  to  speak ; 

None,  with  firm  sneer,  trod  out  in  his  own  heart 

The  sparks  of  love  and  hope  till  there  remained 

Those  bitter  ashes,  a  soul  self-consumed, 

And  the  wretch  crept  a  vampire  among  men, 

Infecting  all  with  his  own  hideous  ill ; 

None  talked  that  common,  false,  cold,  hollow  talk 

Which  makes  the  heart  deny  the  yes  it  breathes, 

Yet  question  that  unmeant  hypocrisy 

With  such  a  self-mistrust  as  has  no  name.  460 

And  women,  too,  frank,  beautiful,  and  kind 

As  the  free  heaven  which  rains  fresh  light  and  dew 

On  the  wide  earth,  past ;  gentle  radiant  forms, 

From  custom's  evil  taint  exempt  and  pure ; 

Speaking  the  wisdom  once  they  could  not  think, 

Looking  emotions  once  they  feared  to  feel, 

And  changed  to  all  which  once  they  dared  not  be, 

Yet  being  now,  made  earth  like  heaven ;  nor  pride, 

Nor  jealousy,  nor  envy,  nor  ill-shame, 

The  bitterest  of  those  drops  of  treasured  gall,  470 

Spoilt  the  sweet  taste  of  the  nepenthe,  love. 

Thrones,  altars,  judgment-seats,  and  prisons,  —  wherein, 

And  beside  which,  by  wretched  men  were  borne 

Sceptres,  tiaras,  swords,  and  chains,  and  tomes 

Of  reasoned  wrong,  glozed  on  by  ignorance,  — 

Were  like  those  monstrous  and  barbaric  shapes, 

The  ghosts  of  a  no  more-remembered  fame, 

Which,  from  their  unworn  obelisks,  look  forth 

In  triumph  o'er  the  palaces  and  tombs 

Of  those  whp  were  their  conquerors,  mouldering  round.    480 


SCENE  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  95 

Those  imaged,  to  the  pride  of  kings  and  priests, 

A  dark  yet  mighty  faith,  a  power  as  wide 

As  is  the  world  it  wasted,  —  and  are  now 

But  an  astonishment.     Even  so  the  tools 

And  emblems  of  its  last  captivity, 

Amid  the  dwellings  of  the  peopled  earth, 

Stand,  not  o'erthrown,  but  unregarded  now. 

And  those  foul  shapes,  abhorred  by  god  and  man, 

Which,  under  many  a  name  and  many  a  form 

Strange,  savage,  ghastly,  dark  and  execrable,  490 

Were  Jupiter,  the  tyrant  of  the  world,  — 

And  which  the  nations,  panic-stricken,  served 

With  blood,  and  hearts  broken  by  long  hope,  and  love 

Dragged  to  his  altars  soiled  and  garlandless, 

And  slain  among  men's  unreclaiming  tears, 

Flattering  the  thing  they  feared,  which  fear  was  hate,  — 

Frown,  mouldering  fast,  o'er  their  abandoned  shrines. 

The  painted  veil,  —  by  those  who  were,  called  life,  — 

Which  mimicked,  as  with  colours  idly  spread, 

All  men  believed  and  hoped,  is  torn  aside.  500 

The  loathsome  mask  has  fallen,  the  man  remains,  — 

Sceptreless,  free,  uncircumscribed,  but  man  : 

Equal,  unclassed,  tribeless,  and  nationless, 

Exempt  from  awe,  worship,  degree,  the  king 

Over  himself;  just,  gentle,  wise  :  but  man. 

Passionless  ?  no  :  —  yet  free  from  guilt  or  pain,  — 

Which  were,  for  his  will  made  or  suffered  them, 

Nor  yet  exempt,  tho'  ruling  them  like  slaves, 

From  chance,  and  death,  and  mutability,  —  ^  * 

The  clogs  of  that  which  else  might  oversoar  510 

The  loftiest  star  of  unascended  heaven, 

Pinnacled  dim  in  the  intense  inane. 


ACT  IV. 

SCENE,  A  part  of  the  Forest  near  the  Cave  of  PROMETHEUS. 
PANTHEA  and  IONE  are  sleeping:  they  awaken  gradually 
during  the  first  Song. 

VOICE  of  Unseen  Spirits. 

The  pale  stars  are  gone  ! 
For  the  sun,  their  swift  shepherd, 
To  their  folds  them  compelling, 
In  the  depths  of  the  dawn, 
Hastes,  in  meteor- eclipsing  array,  and  they  flee 
Beyond  his  blue  dwelling, 
As  fawns  flee  the  leopard. 
But  where  are  ye  ? 

A  train  of  dark  Forms  and  Shadows  passes  by  confusedly, 

singing. 

Here,  oh,  here  : 

We  bear  the  bier  10 

Of  the  Father  of  many  a  cancelled  year  ! 
Spectres  we 
Of  the  dead  Hours  be, 
We  bear  Time  to  his  tomb  in  eternity. 

Strew,  oh,  strew 
Hair,  not  yew ! 
Wet  the  dusty  pall  with  tears,  not  dew  ! 


[ACT  iv.J  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  97 

Be  the  faded  flowers 
Of  Death's  bare  bowers 
Spread  on  the  corpse  of  the  King  of  Hours  !  20 

Haste,  oh,  haste  ! 

As  shades  are  chased, 
Trembling,  by  day,  from  heaven's  blue  waste. 

We  melt  away, 

Like  dissolving  spray, 
From  the  children  of  a  diviner  day, 

With  the  lullaby 

Of  winds  that  die  . 

On  the  bosom  of  their  own  harmony  ! 

IONE. 
What  dark  forms  were  they?  30 

PANTHEA. 

The  past  Hours  weak  and  grey, 
With  the  spoil  which  their  toil 

Raked  together 
From  the  conquest  but  One  could  foil. 

IONE. 
Have  they  past? 

PANTHEA. 

They  have  past ; 
They  outspeeded  the  blast, 
While  'tis  said,  they  are  fled : 

IONE.  ^ 

Whither,  oh,  whither? 


98  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

PANTHEA. 
To  the  dark,  to  the  past,  to  the  dead. 

VOICE  of  Unseen  Spirits. 

Bright  clouds  float  in  heaven,  40 

Dew-stars  gleam  on  earth, 
Waves  assemble  on  ocean, 
They  are  gathered  and  driven 
By  the  storm  of  delight,  by  the  panic  of  glee  ! 
They  shake  with  emotion, 
They  dance  in  their  mirth. 
But  where  are  ye  ? 

The  pine  boughs  are  singing 
Old  songs  with  new  gladness, 
The  billows  and  fountains  50 

Fresh  music  are  flinging, 

Like  the  notes  of  a  spirit  from  land  and  from  sea ; 
The  storms  mock  the  mountains 
With  the  thunder  of  gladness. 
But  where  are  ye  ? 

ZONE. 
What  charioteers  are  these? 

PANTHEA. 

Where  are  their  chariots  ? 

SEMICHORUS  OF  HOURS. 
The  voice  of  the  Spirits  of  Air  and  of  Earth 

Have  drawn  back  the  figured  curtain  of  sleep 
Which  covered  our  being  and  darkened  our  birth 

In  the  deep. 


ACT  iv.J  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  99 

A  VOICE. 
In  the  deep  ? 

SEMICHORUS  II. 

Oh,  below  the  deep.  60 

SEMICHORUS  I. 
An  hundred  ages  we  had  been  kept 

Cradled  in  visions  of  hate  and  care, 
And  each  one  who  waked  as  his  brother  slept, 

Found  the  truth  — 

SEMICHORUS  II. 

Worse  than  his  visions  were  ! 

SEMICHORUS  I. 
We  have  heard  the  lute  of  Hope  in  sleep ; 

We  have  known  the  voice  of  Love  in  dreams, 
We  have  felt  the  wand  of  Power,  and  leap  — 

SEMICHORUS  II. 
As  the  billows  leap  in  the  morning  beams  ! 

CHORUS. 
Weave  the  dance  on  the  floor  of  the  breeze, 

Pierce  with  song  heaven's  silent  light,  70 

Enchant  the  day  that  too  swiftly  flees, 

To  check  its  flight  ere  the  cave  of  night. 

Once  the  hungry  Hours  were  hounds 

Which  chased  the  day  like  a  bleeding  deer, 

And  it  limped  and  stumbled  with  many  wounds 
Through  the  nightly  dells  of  the  desart  year. 


100  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

But  now,  oh  weave  the  mystic  measure 
Of  music,  and  dance,  and  shapes  of  light, 

Let  the  Hours,  and  the  spirits  of  might  and  pleasure, 
Like  the  clouds  and  sunbeams,  unite. 

A  VOICE. 

Unite  80 

PANTHEA. 

See,  where  the  Spirits  of  the  human  mind 

Wrapped  in  sweet  sounds,  as  in  bright  veils,  approach. 

CHORUS  OF  SPIRITS. 

We  join  the  throng 

Of  the  dance  and  the  song, 
By  the  whirlwind  of  gladness  borne  along ; 

As  the  flying-fish  leap 

From  the  Indian  deep, 
And  mix  with  the  sea-birds,  half  asleep. 

CHORUS  OF  HOURS. 
Whence  come  ye,  so  wild  and  so  fleet, 
For  sandals  of  lightning  are  on  your  feet,  90 

And  your  wings  are  soft  and  swift  as  thought, 
And  your  eyes  are  as  love  which  is  veiled  not  ? 

CHORUS  OF  SPIRITS  OF  THE  MIND. 

We  come  from  the  mind 

Of  human  kind, 
Which  was  late  so  dusk,  and  obscene,  and  blind, 

Now  'tis  an  ocean 

Of  clear  emotion, 
A  heaven  of  serene  and  mighty  motion. 


ACT  iv.J  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  101 

From  that  deep  abyss 

Of  wonder  and  bliss, 
Whose  caverns  are  crystal  palaces ; 

From  those  skiey  towers 

Where  Thought's  crowned  powers 
Sit  watching  your  dance,  ye  happy  Hours  ! 

From  the  dim  recesses 

Of  woven  caresses, 
Where  lovers  catch  ye  by  your  loose  tresses ; 

From  the  azure  isles, 

Where  sweet  Wisdom  smiles, 
Delaying  your  ships  with  her  siren  wiles. 

From  the  temples  high 

Of  Man's  ear  and  eye, 
Roofed  over  Sculpture  and  Poesy  ; 

From  the  murmurings 

Of  the  unsealed  springs 
Where  Science  bedews  his  Daedal  wings. 

Years  after  years, 

Through  blood,  and  tears, 
And  a  thick  hell  of  hatreds,  and  hopes,  and  fears  ; 

We  waded  and  flew, 

And  the  islets  were  few 
Where  the  bud-blighted  flowers  of  happiness  grew. 

Our  feet  now,  every  palm, 

Are  sandalled  with  calm, 
And  the  dew  of  our  wings  is  a  rain  of  balm ; 

And,  beyond  our  eyes, 

The  human  love  lies 
Which  makes  all  it  gazes  on  Paradise. 


102  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

CHORUS  OF  SPIRITS  AND  HOURS. 
Then  weave  the  web  of  the  mystic  measure  ; 

From  the  depths  of  the  sky  and  the  ends  of  the  earth,    130 
Come,  swift  Spirits  of  might  and  of  pleasure, 

Fill  the  dance  and  the  music  of  mirth, 
As  the  waves  of  a  thousand  streams  rush  by 
To  an  ocean  of  splendour  and  harmony  ! 

CHORUS  OF  SPIRITS  OF  THE  MIND. 

Our  spoil  is  won, 

Our  task  is  done, 
We  are  free  to  dive,  or  soar,  or  run ; 

Beyond  and  around, 

Or  within  the  bound 
Which  clips  the  world  with  darkness  round,  140 

We'll  pass  the  eyes 

Of  the  starry  skies 
Into  the  hoar  deep  to  colonize  : 

Death,  Chaos,  and  Night, 

From  the  sound  of  our  flight, 
Shall  flee,  like  rnist  from  a  tempest's  might. 

And  Earth,  Air,  and  Light, 

And  the  Spirit  of  Might, 
Which  drives  round  the  stars  in  their  fiery  flight; 

And  Love,  Thought,  and  Breath,  150 

The  powers  that  quell  Death, 
Wherever  we  soar  shall  assemble  beneath. 

And  our  singing  shall  build 
In  the  void's  loose  field 
A  world  for  the  Spirit  of  Wisdom  to  wield ; 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  103 

We  will  take  our  plan 
From  the  new  world  of  man, 
And  our  work  shall  be  called  the  Promethean. 

CHORUS  OF  HOURS. 
Break  the  dance,  and  scatter  the  song ; 

Let  some  depart,  and  some  remain.  160 

SEMICHORUS  I. 
We,  beyond  heaven,  are  driven  along  : 

SEMICHORUS  II. 
Us  the  enchantments  of  earth  retain  : 

SEMICHORUS  I. 

Ceaseless,  and  rapid,  and  fierce,  and  free, 
With  the  Spirits  which  build  a  new  earth  and  sea, 
And  a  heaven  where  yet  heaven  could  never  be. 

SEMICHORUS  II. 

Solemn,  and  slow,  and  serene,  and  bright, 
Leading  the  Day  and  outspeeding  the  Night, 
With  the  powers  of  a  world  of  perfect  light. 

SEMICHORUS  I. 

We  whirl,  singing  loud,  round  the  gathering  sphere, 
Till  the  trees,  and  the  beasts,  and  the  clouds  appear      170 
From  its  chaos  made  calm  by  love,  not  fear. 

SEMICHORUS  II. 

We  encircle  the  ocean  and  mountains  of  earth, 
And  the  happy  forms  of  its  death  and  birth  *^ 

Change  to  the  music  of  our  sweet  mirth. 


104  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

CHORUS  OF  HOURS  AND  SPIRITS. 

Break  the  dance,  and  scatter  the  song, 

Let  some  depart,  and  some  remain, 
Wherever  we  fly  we  lead  along 
In  leashes,  like  starbeams,  soft  yet  strong, 

The  clouds  that  are  heavy  with  love's  sweet  rain. 

PANTHEA. 
Ha  !  they  are  gone  ! 

IONE. 

Yet  feel  you  no  delight  180 

From  the  past  sweetness  ? 

PANTHEA. 

As  the  bare  green  hill 
When  some  soft  cloud  vanishes  into  rain, 
Laughs  with  a  thousand  drops  of  sunny  water 
To  the  unpavilioned  sky  ! 

IONE. 

Even  whilst  we  speak 
New  notes  arise.     What  is  that  awful  sound  ? 

PANTHEA. 

'Tis  the  deep  music  of  the  rolling  world 
Kindling  within  the  strings  of  the  waved  air, 
^Eolian  modulations. 

IONE. 

Listen  too, 

How  every  pause  is  filled  with  under- notes, 
Clear,  silver,  icy,  keen  awakening  tones,  190 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  105 

Which  pierce  the  sense,  and  live  within  the  soul, 
As  the  sharp  stars  pierce  winter's  crystal  air 
And  gaze  upon  themselves  within  the  sea. 

PANTHEA. 

But  see  where  through  two  openings  in  the  forest 

Which  hanging  branches  overcanopy, 

And  where  two  runnels  of  a  rivulet, 

Between  the  close  moss  violet-inwoven, 

Have  made  their  path  of  melody,  like  sisters 

Who  part  with  sighs  that  they  may  meet  in  smiles, 

Turning  their  dear  disunion  to  an  isle  200 

Of  lovely  grief,  a  wood  of  sweet  sad  thoughts ; 

Two  visions  of  strange  radiance  float  upon 

The  ocean-like  enchantment  of  strong  sound, 

Which  flows  intenser,  keener,  deeper  yet, 

Under  the  ground  and  through  the  windless  air. 

IONE. 

I  see  a  chariot  like  that  thinnest  boat, 

In  which  the  mother  of  the  months  is  borne 

By  ebbing  night  into  her  western  cave, 

When  she  upsprings  from  interlunar  dreams, 

O'er  which  is  curved  an  orblike  canopy  210 

Of  gentle  darkness,  and  the  hills  and  woods 

Distinctly  seen  through  that  dusk  airy  veil, 

Regard  like  shapes  in  an  enchanter's  glass ; 

Its  wheels  are  solid  clouds,  azure  and  gold, 

Such  as  the  genii  of  the  thunder-storm 

Pile  on  the  floor  of  the  illumined  sea 

When  the  sun  rushes  under  it ;  they  roll 


106  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

And  move  and  grow  as  with  an  inward  wind ; 

Within  it  sits  a  winged  infant,  white 

Its  countenance,  like  the  whiteness  of  bright  snow,  220 

Its  plumes  are  as  feathers  of  sunny  frost, 

Its  limbs  gleam  white,  through  the  wind-flowing  folds 

Of  its  white  robe,  woof  of  aetherial  pearl. 

Its  hair  is  white,  the  brightness  of  white  light 

Scattered  in  strings;  yet  its  two  eyes  are  heavens 

Of  liquid  darkness,  which  the  Deity 

Within  seems  pouring,  as  a  storm  is  poured 

From  jagged  clouds,  out  of  their  arrowy  lashes, 

Tempering  the  cold  and  radiant  air  around, 

With  fire  that  is  not  brightness  ;  in  its  hand  230 

It  sways  a  quivering  moon-beam,  from  whose  point 

A  guiding  power  directs  the  chariot's  prow 

Over  its  wheeled  clouds,  which  as  they  roll 

Over  the  grass,  and  flowers,  and  waves,  wake  sounds, 

Sweet  as  a  singing  rain  of  silver  dew. 

PANTHEA. 

And  from  the  other  opening  in  the  wood 

Rushes,  with  loud  and  whirlwind  harmony, 

A  sphere,  which  is  as  many  thousand  spheres, 

Solid  as  crystal,  yet  through  all  its  mass 

Flow,  as  through  empty  space,  music  and  light :  240 

Ten  thousand  orbs  involving  and  involved, 

Purple  and  azure,  white,  green,  and  golden, 

Sphere  within  sphere ;  and  every  space  between 

Peopled  with  unimaginable  shapes, 

Such  as  ghosts  dream  dwell  in  the  lampless  deep, 

Yet  each  inter-transpicuous,  and  they  whirl 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  107 

Over  each  other  with  a  thousand  motions, 

Upon  a  thousand  sightless  axles  spinning, 

And  with  the  force  of  self-destroying  swiftness, 

Intensely,  slowly,  solemnly  roll  on.  250 

Kindling  with  mingled  sounds,  and  many  tones, 

Intelligible  word's  and  music  wild. 

With  mighty  whirl  the  multitudinous  orb 

Grinds  the  bright  brook  into  an  azure  mist 

Of  elemental  subtlety,  like  light ; 

And  the  wild  odour  of  the  forest  flowers, 

The  music  of  the  living  grass  and  air, 

The  emerald  light  of  leaf- entangled  beams 

Round  its  intense  yet  self-conflicting  speed, 

Seem  kneaded  into  one  aerial  mass  260 

Which  drowns  the  sense.     Within  the  orb  itself, 

Pillowed  upon  its  alabaster  arms, 

Like  to  a  child  o'erwearied  with  sweet  toil, 

On  its  own  folded  wings  and  wavy  hair, 

The  Spirit  of  the  Earth  is  laid  asleep, 

And  you  can  see  its  little  lips  are  moving, 

Amid  the  changing  light  of  their  own  smiles, 

Like  one  who  talks  of  what  he  loves  in  dream. 

IONE. 
'Tis  only  mocking  the  orb's  harmony. 

PANTHEA. 

And  from  a  star  upon  its  forehead,  shoot,  270 

Like  swords  of  azure  fire,  or  golden  spears 
With  tyrant-quelling  myrtle  overtwined, 
Embleming  heaven  and  earth  united  now, 


108  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

Vast  beams  like  spokes  of  some  invisible  wheel 

Which  whirl  as  the  orb  whirls,  swifter  than  thought, 

Filling  the  abyss  with  sun-like  lightnings, 

And  perpendicular  now,  and  now  transverse, 

Pierce  the  dark  soil,  and  as  they  pierce  and  pass, 

Make  bare  the  secrets  of  the  earth's  deep  heart ; 

Infinite  mine  of  adamant  and  gold,  280 

Valueless  stones  and  unimagined  gems, 

And  caverns  on  crystalline  columns  poised 

With  vegetable  silver  overspread  ; 

Wells  of  unfathomed  fire,  and  water-springs 

Whence  the  great  sea,  even  as  a  child  is  fed, 

Whose  vapours  clothe  earth's  monarch  mountain-tops 

With  kingly,  ermine  snow.     The  beams  flash  on, 

And  make  appear  the  melancholy  ruins 

Of  cancelled  cycles  ;  anchors,  beaks  of  ships ; 

Planks  turned  to  marble  ;  quivers,  helms,  and  spears,        290 

And  gorgon-headed  targes,  and  the  wheels 

Of  scythed  chariots,  and  the  emblazonry 

Of  trophies,  standards,  and  armorial  beasts, 

Round  which  Death  laughed,  sepulchred  emblems 

Of  dead  destruction,  ruin  within  ruin  ! 

The  wrecks  beside  of  many  a  city  vast, 

Whose  population  which  the  earth  grew  over 

Was  mortal,  but  not  human  ;  see,  they  lie, 

Their  monstrous  works  and  uncouth  skeletons, 

Their  statues,  homes  and  fanes  ;  prodigious  shapes  300 

Huddled  in  grey  annihilation,  split, 

Jammed  in  the  hard,  black  deep ;  and  over  these, 

The  anatomies  of  unknown  winged  things, 

And  fishes  which  were  isles  of  living  scale, 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  109 

And  serpents,  bony  chains,  twisted  around 

The  iron  crags,  or  within  heaps  of  dust 

To  which  the  tortuous  strength  of  their  last  pangs 

Had  crushed  the  iron  crags ;  and  over  these 

The  jagged  alligator,  and  the  might 

Of  earth-convulsing  behemoth,  which  once  310 

Were  monarch  beasts,  and  orr  the  slimy  shores, 

And  weed-overgrown  continents  of  earth, 

Increased  and  multiplied  like  summer  worms 

On  an  abandoned  corpse,  till  the  blue  globe 

Wrapt  deluge  round  it  like  a  cloke,  and  they 

Yelled,  gasped,  and  were  abolished  ;  or  some  God 

Whose  throne  was  in  a  comet,  past,  and  cried, 

Be  not !     And  like  my  words  they  were  no  more. 

THE  EARTH. 

The  joy,  the  triumph,  the  delight,  the  madness  ! 

The  boundless,  overflowing,  bursting  gladness,  320 

The  vaporous  exultation  not  to  be  confined  ! 

Ha  !  ha  !  the  animation  of  delight 

Which  wraps  me,  like  an  atmosphere  of  light, 
And  bears  me  as  a  cloud  is  borne  by  its  own  wind. 

THE  MOON. 

Brother  mine,  calm  wanderer, 

Happy  globe  of  land  and  air, 
Some  Spirit  is  darted  like  a  beam  from  thee, 

Which  penetrates  my  frozen  frame, 

And  passes  with  the  warmth  of  flame, 
With  love,  and  odour,  and  deep  melody  330 

V^4 

Through  me,  through  me  ! 


110  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

THE  EARTH. 

Ha  !  ha  !  the  caverns  of  my  hollow  mountains, 
My  cloven  fire-crags,  sound-exulting  fountains 

Laugh  with  a  vast  and  inextinguishable  laughter. 
The  oceans,  and  the  desarts,  and  the  abysses, 
And  the  deep  air's  unmeasured  wildernesses, 

Answer  from  all  their  clouds  a"nd  billows,  echoing  after. 

They  cry  aloud  as  I  do.     Sceptred  curse, 

Who  all  our  green  and  azure  universe 
Threatenedst  to  muffle  round  with  black  destruction, 

sending  340 

A  solid  cloud  to  rain  hot  thunder-stones, 

And  splinter  and  knead  down  my  children's  bones, 
All  I  bring  forth,  to  one  void  mass  battering  and  blending  — 

Until  each  crag-like  tower,  and  storied  column, 

Palace,  and  obelisk,  and  temple  solemn, 
My  imperial  mountains  crowned  with  cloud,  and  snow, 
and  fire ; 

My  sea-like  forests,  every  blade  and  blossom 

Which  finds  a  grave  or  cradle  in  my  bosom, 
Were  stamped  by  thy  strong  hate  into  a  lifeless  mire  — 

How  art  thou  sunk,  withdrawn,  covered,  drunk  up         350 

By  thirsty  nothing,  as  the  brackish  cup 
Drained  by  a  desart-troop,  a  little  drop  for  all ; 

And  from  beneath,  around,  within,  above, 

Filling  thy  void  annihilation,  love 
Burst  in  like  light  on  caves  cloven  by  the  thunder-ball. 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  Ill 

THE  MOON. 

The  snow  upon  my  lifeless  mountains 
Is  loosened  into  living  fountains, 
My  solid  oceans  flow,  and  sing,  and  shine : 
A  spirit  from  my  heart  bursts  forth, 
It  clothes  with  unexpected  birth  360 

My  cold  bare  bosom  :  Oh  !  it  must  be  thine 
On  mine,  on  mine  ! 

Gazing  on  thee,  I  feel,  I  know 

Green  stalks  burst  forth,  and  bright  flowers  grow, 
And  living  shapes  upon  my  bosom  move  : 

Music  is  in  the  sea  and  air, 

Winged  clouds  soar  here  and  there, 
Dark  with  the  rain  new  buds  are  dreaming  of: 
'Tis  love,  all  love  ! 

THE  EARTH. 

It  interpenetrates  my  granite  mass,  370 

Through  tangled  roots  and  trodden  clay  doth  pass, 
Into  the  utmost  leaves  and  delicatest  flowers ; 

Upon  the  winds,  among  the  clouds  'tis  spread, 

It  wakes  a  life  in  the  forgotten  dead, 
They  breathe  a  spirit  up  from  their  obscurest  bowers. 

And  like  a  storm  bursting  its  cloudy  prison 
With  thunder,  and  with  whirlwind,  has  arisen 

Out  of  the  lampless  caves  of  unimagined  being  : 
With  earthquake  shock  and  swiftness  making  shiver 
Thought's  stagnant  chaos,  unremoved  for  ever,        .     380 

Till  hate,  and  fear,  and  pain,  light-vanquished  shadows, 
fleeing, 


112  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

Leave  Man,  who  was  a  many  sided  mirror, 
Which  could  distort  to  many  a  shade  of  error, 

This  true  fair  world  of  things,  a  sea  reflecting  love  ; 
Which  over  all  his  kind  as  the  sun's  heaven 
Gliding  o'er  ocean,  smooth,  serene,  and  even 

Darting  from  starry  depths  radiance  and  life,  doth  move, 

Leave  Man,  even  as  a  leprous  child  is  left, 

Who  follows  a  sick  beast  to  some  warm  cleft 
Of  rocks,  through  which  the  might  of  healing  springs 

is  poured ;  390 

Then  when  it  wanders  home  with  rosy  smile, 

Unconscious,  and  its  mother  fears  awhile 
It  is  a  spirit,  then,  weeps  on  her  child  restored. 

Man,  oh,  not  men !  a  chain  of  linked  thought, 

Of  love  and  might  to  be  divided  not, 
Compelling  the  elements  with  adamantine  stress ; 

As  the  Sun  rules,  even  with  a  tyrant's  gaze, 

The  unquiet  republic  of  the  maze 
Of  planets,  struggling  fierce  towards  heaven's  free  wil- 
derness. 

Man,  one  harmonious  soul  of  many  a  soul,  400 

Whose  nature  is  its  own  divine  control, 
Where  all  things  flow  to  all,  as  rivers  to  the  sea; 

Familiar  acts  are  beautiful  through  love ; 

Labour,  and  pain,  and  grief,  in  life's  green  grove 
Sport  like  tame  beasts,  none  knew  how  gentle  they  could 
be! 

His  will,  with  all  mean  passions,  bad  delights, 
And  selfish  cares,  its  trembling  satellites, 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  113 

A  spirit  ill  to  guide,  but  mighty  to  obey, 

Is  as  a  tempest-winged  ship,  whose  helm 

Love  rules  through  waves  which  dare  not  overwhelm,    410 
Forcing  life's  wildest  shores  to  own  its  sovereign  sway. 

All  things  confess  his  strength.    Through  the  cold 

mass 

Of  marble  and  of  colour  his  dreams  pass ; 
Bright  threads  whence  mothers  weave  the  robes  their 

children  wear ; 

Language  is  a  perpetual  orphic  song, 
Which  rules  with  Daedal  harmony  a  throng 
Of  thoughts  and  forms,  which  else  senseless  and  shape- 
less were. 

The  lightning  is  his  slave ;  heaven's  utmost  deep 

Gives  up  her  stars,  and  like  a  flock  of  sheep 
They  pass  before  his  eye,  are  numbered,  and  roll  on  !       420 

The  tempest  is  his  steed,  he  strides  the  air ; 

And  the  abyss  shouts  from  her  depth  laid  bare, 
Heaven,  hast  thou  secrets  ?     Man  unveils  me ;  I  have 
none. 

THE  MOON. 

The  shadow  of  white  death  has  past 

From  my  path  in  heaven  at  last, 
A  clinging  shroud  of  solid  frost  and  sleep ; 

And  through  my  newly- woven  bowers,  ^  , 

Wander  happy  paramours, 
Less  mighty,  but  as  mild  as  those  who  keep 

Thy  vales  more  deep.  430 


114  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  IV. 

THE  EARTH. 

As  the  dissolving  warmth  of  dawn  may  fold 
A  half  unfrozen  dew-globe,  green,  and  gold, 

And  crystalline,  till  it  becomes  a  winged  mist, 
And  wanders  up  the  vault  of  the  blue  day, 
Outlives  the  noon,  and  on  the  sun's  last  ray 

Hangs  o'er  the  sea,  a  fleece  of  fire  and  amethyst. 

THE  MOON. 

Thou  art  folded,  thou  art  lying 

In  the  light  which  is  undying 
Of  thine  own  joy,  and  heaven's  smile  divine ; 

All  suns  and  constellations  shower  440 

On  thee  a  light,  a  life,  a  power 
Which  doth  array  thy  sphere  ;  thou  pourest  thine 
On  mine,  on  mine  ! 

THE  EARTH. 

I  spin  beneath  my  pyramid  of  night, 

Which  points  into  the  heavens  dreaming  delight, 
Murmuring  victorious  joy  in  my  enchanted  sleep ; 

As  a  youth  lulled  in  love-dreams  faintly  sighing, 

Under  the  shadow  of  his  beauty  lying, 
Which  round  his  rest  a  watch  of  light  and  warmth  doth 
keep. 

THE  MOON. 

As  in  the  soft  and  sweet  eclipse,  450 

When  soul  meets  soul  on  lovers'  lips, 
High  hearts  are  calm,  and  brightest  eyes  are  dull ; 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  115 

So  when  thy  shadow  falls  on  me, 
Then  am  I  mute  and  still,  by  thee 
Covered  ;  of  thy  love,  Orb  most  beautiful, 
Full,  oh,  too  full ! 

Thou  art  speeding  round  the  sun, 

Brightest  world  of  many  a  one ; 

Green  and  azure  sphere  which  shinest 

With  a  light  which  is  divinest  460 

Among  all  the  lamps  of  Heaven 

To  whom  life  and  light  is  given ; 

I,  thy  crystal  paramour 

Borne  beside  thee  by  a  power 

Like  the  polar  Paradise, 

Magnet-like,  of  lovers'  eyes ; 

I,  a  most  enamoured  maiden 

Whose  weak  brain  is  overladen 

With  the  pleasure  of  her  love, 

Maniac-like  around  thee  move  470 

Gazing,  an  insatiate  bride, 

On  thy  form  from  every  side 

Like  a  Maenad,  round  the  cup 

Which  Agave  lifted  up 

In  the  weird  Cadmsean  forest. 

Brother,  wheresoe'er  thou  soarest 

I  must  hurry,  whirl  and  follow 

Through  the  heavens  wide  and  hollow 

Sheltered  by  the  warm  embrace  .*..- 

Of  thy  soul  from  hungry  space,  480 

Drinking  from  thy  sense  and  sight 

Beauty,  majesty,  and  might, 


116  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

As  a  lover  or  a  cameleon 

Grows  like  what  it  looks  upon, 

As  a  violet's  gentle  eye 

Gazes  on  the  azure  sky 
Until  its  hue  grows  like  what  it  beholds, 

As  a  grey  and  watery  mist 

Glows  like  solid  amethyst 

Athwart  the  western  mountain  it  enfolds,  490 

When  the  sunset  sleeps 
Upon  its  snow. 

THE  EARTH. 
And  the  weak  day  weeps 

That  it  should  be  so. 

Oh,  gentle  Moon,  the  voice  of  thy  delight 
Falls  on  me  like  the  clear  and  tender  light 
Soothing  the  seaman,  borne  the  summer  night 

Through  isles  for  ever  calm  ; 
Oh,  gentle  Moon,  thy  crystal  accents  pierce 
The  caverns  of  my  pride's  deep  universe,  500 

Charming  the  tiger  joy,  whose  tramplings  fierce 
Made  wounds  which  need  thy  balm. 

PANTHEA. 

I  rise  as  from  a  bath  of  sparkling  water, 
A  bath  of  azure  light,  among  dark  rocks, 
Out  of  the  stream  of  sound. 

IONE. 

Ah  me  !  sweet  sister, 
The  stream  of  sound  has  ebbed  away  from  us, 


ACTivJ  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  117 

And  you  pretend  to  rise  out  of  its  wave, 
Because  your  words  fall  like  the  clear,  soft  dew 
Shaken  from  a  bathing  wood-nymph's  limbs  and  hair. 

PANTHEA. 

Peace  !  peace  !     A  mighty  Power  which  is  as  darkness,     510 

Is  rising  out  of  Earth,  and  from  the  sky 

Is  showered  like  night,  and  from  within  the  air 

Bursts,  like  eclipse  which  had  been  gathered  up 

Into  the  pores  of  sunlight :  the  bright  visions, 

Wherein  the  singing  spirits  rode  and  shone, 

Gleam  like  pale  meteors  through  a  watery  night. 

IONE. 
There  is  a  sense  of  words  upon  mine  ear. 

PANTHEA. 
An  universal  sound  like  words  :  Oh,  list ! 

DEMOGORGON. 

Thou,  Earth,  calm  empire  of  a  happy  soul, 

Sphere  of  divinest  shapes  and  harmonies,  520 

Beautiful  orb  !  gathering  as  thou  dost  roll 
The  love  which  paves  thy  path  along  the  skies  ; 

THE  EARTH. 
I  hear  :  I  am  as  a  drop  of  dew  that  dies. 

DEMOGORGON. 

Thou,  Moon,  which  gazest  on  the  nightly  Earth 
With  wonder,  as  it  gazes  upon  thee ; 


]18  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

Whilst  each  to  men,  and  beasts,  and  the  swift  birth 
Of  birds,  is  beauty,  love,  calm,  harmony  : 

THE  MOON. 
I  hear  :  I  am  a  leaf  shaken  by  thee  ! 

DEMOGORGON. 

Ye  kings  of  suns  and  stars,  Daemons  and  Gods, 
/Ethereal  Dominations,  who  possess  530 

Elysian,  windless,  fortunate  abodes 

Beyond  Heaven's  constellated  wilderness  : 

A  VOICE  from  above. 

Our  great  Republic  hears,  we  are  blest,  and  bless. 

DEMOGORGON. 

Ye  happy  dead,  whose  beams  of  brightest  verse 
Are  clouds  to  hide,  not  colours  to  pourtray, 

Whether  your  nature  is  that  universe 
Which  once  ye  saw  and  suffered  — 

A  VOICE  from  btneath. 

Or  as  they 
Whom  we  have  left,  we  change  and  pass  away. 

DEMOGORGON. 

Ye  elemental  Genii,  who  have  homes 

From  man's  high  mind  even  to  the  central  stone       540 
Of  sullen  lead  ;  from  Heaven's  star-fretted  domes 

To  the  dull  weed  some  sea-worm  battens  on : 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  119 

A  CONFUSED  VOICE. 
We  hear  :  thy  words  waken  Oblivion. 

DEMOGORGON. 

Spirits,  whose  homes  are  flesh  :  ye  beasts  and  birds, 
Ye  worms,  and  fish ;  ye  living^  leaves  and  buds  ; 

Lightning  and  wind  ;  and  ye  untameable  herds, 
Meteors  and  mists,  which  throng  air's  solitudes  : 

A  VOICE. 
Thy  voice  to  us  is  wind  among  still  woods. 

DEMOGORGON. 

Man,  who  wert  once  a  despot  and  a  slave ; 

A  dupe  and  a  deceiver ;  a  decay ;  550 

A  traveller  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave 

Through  the  dim  night  of  this  immortal  day : 

ALL. 
Speak :  thy  strong  words  may  never  pass  away. 

DEMOGORGON. 

This  is  the  day,  which  down  the  void  abysm 

At  the  Earth-born's  spell  yawns  for  Heaven's  despotism, 

And  Conquest  is  dragged  captive  through  the  deep : 
Love,  from  its  awful  throne  of  patient  power 
In  the  wise  heart,  from  the  last  giddy  hour 

Of  dead  endurance,  from  the  slippery,  steep, 
And  narrow  verge  of  crag-like  agony,  springs  360 

And  folds  over  the  world  its  healing  wings. 


120  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv.] 

Gentleness,  Virtue,  Wisdom,  and  Endurance, 
These  are  the  seals  of  that  most  firm  assurance 

Which  bars  the  pit  over  Destruction's  strength ; 
And  if,  with  infirm  hand,  Eternity, 
Mother  of  many  acts  and  hours,  should  free 

The  serpent  that  would  clasp  her  with  his  length  ; 
These  are  the  spells  by  which  to  re-assume 
An  empire  o'er  the  disentangled  doom. 

To  suffer  woes  which  Hope  thinks  infinite ;  570 

To  forgive  wrongs  darker  than  death  or  night ; 

To  defy  Power,  which  seems  omnipotent ; 
To  love,  and  bear ;  to  hope  till  Hope  creates 
From  its  own  wreck  the  thing  it  contemplates  ; 

Neither  to  change,  nor  faulter,  nor  repent ; 
This,  like  thy  glory,  Titan,  is  to  be 
Good,  great  and  joyous,  beautiful  and  free  ; 
This  is  alone  Life,  Joy,  Empire,  and  Victory. 


SUGGESTIONS 

TOWARDS  A  COMPARISON  OF  THE  PROMETHEUS 
UNBOUND  WITH  THE  PROMETHEUS  BOUND  OF 
AESCHYLUS. 

WE  know  that  Shelley,  though  not  an  accurate  Greek 
scholar,  read  Greek  with  eagerness  and  ease.  Of  the  period 
during  which  the  Prometheus  Unbound  was  written,  Mrs. 
Shelley  tells  us  :  "  The  Greek  tragedians  were  now  his  most 
familiar  companions,  and  the  sublime  majesty  of  ^Eschylus 
filled  him  with  wonder  and  delight."  Prometheus  Bound 
had  a  special  attraction  for  Shelley,  whose  audacious  soul, 
always  sympathetic  with  rebellion, '  was  inevitably  drawn 
towards  the  most  audacious  expression  of  Greek  genius. 
The  Prometheus  Unbound  is  steeped  in  the  spirit  of  ^Eschy- 
lus.  All  the  more  striking  is  the  originality  of  Shelley,  both 
in  conception  and  in  treatment.  There  is  no  trace  of 
plagiarism  in  his  manner,  yet  the  whole  drama  reveals  how 
deeply  and  in  what  subtle  ways  one  great  imaginative  writer 
may  influence  another. 

In  form,  the  Prometheus  Unbound  is  more  akin  to  the 
Greek  type  of  drama  than  to  the  Shakespearean  type ;  for,  as 
in  the  Greek,  the  lyrical  element  has  nearly  or  quite  as  much 
structural  importance  as  the  blank  verse.  Shelley  has 
indeed  the  modern  division  into  acts ;  but  an  equally  essen- 

121 


122  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

tial  division  is  signalled  by  the  great  choral  passages.  The 
modernness  of  Shelley's  drama  is  however  evident  in  the 
more  subtle  and  free  interfusion  of  lyric  with  recitative,  and 
the  far  greater  elaboration  of  the  personages  and  function  of 
the  chorus.  In  ^schylus,  the  Chorus  is  a  band  of  Sea- 
nymphs,  who  wing  their  way  upward  from  the  ocean  to 
console  Prometheus,  and  settle  at  the  rock  at  his  feet 
(lines  128-135  )  277-282).  In  Shelley,  the  chief  characters 
who  sustain  the  Chorus  are  also  Sea-nymphs,  —  lone  and 
Panthea,  who,  like  the  nymphs  of  ^schylus,  sit  with  droop- 
ing wings  on  the  cliff  below  Prometheus,  and  cheer  him 
with  their  sympathy.  But  with  the  songs  of  these  Daughters 
of  Ocean  are  blended  the  voices  of  the  whole  creation, — 
Spirits  of  Nature,  of  the  Human  Mind,  of  unguessed  Powers 
of  Evil,  —  who  fill  with  music  every  pause  in  the  drama. 
Moreover,  in  Shelley  the  Chorus-characters  are  far  more 
closely  interwoven  with  the  structure  of  the  drama  than  in 
yEschylus.  The  chorus  of  the  Prometheus  Bound  holds  the 
simple  position  of  the  observer,  and  its  function  is  to 
express  emotional  sympathy :  the  chorus-voices  of  the  Pro- 
metheus Unbound  again  and  again  further  the  action. 

Indeed,  the  structure  of  the  modern  drama  is  at  every 
point  both  more  complex  and  more  organic  than  that  of  the 
Greek  drama.  There  are  more  leading  characters,  and 
their  relation  to  each  other  is  less  purely  incidental. 
yEschylus  suggests  indeed  a  fine  character-contrast  between 
Prometheus  and  lo :  the  Titan  suffering  from  the  hate  of 
Zeus,  the  woman  from  his  love,  the  Titan  an  image  of  proud 
and  still  stoicism,  the  woman  of  restless  and  uncontrolled 
passion.  But,  as  far  as  the  story  is  concerned,  Prometheus 
and  lo  are  bound  together  simply  by  the  mechanical  tie  of 


PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  123 

common  suffering,  and  by  the  prophecy  of  the  age  to  come, 
when  Herakles,  the  descendant  of  lo,  shall  release  the 
Titan.  Prometheus  and  Asia  are  far  more  deeply  united. 
Their  relation  is  an  essential  fact  in  the  drama,  and  their 
destinies  are  one,  alike  in  the  external  and  in  the  spiritual 
narrative.  The  subordinate  characters  also  all  play  a 
necessary  part  in  the  action.  This  closer  structural  unity  of 
Shelley's  drama  is  entirely  modern. 

The  conception  of  the  central  character,  again,  differs 
widely  in  the  two  dramas.  The  Prometheus  of  ^Eschylus  is 
by  no  means  an  ideal  hero,  even  to  us,  who  have  with  the 
Rebel  an  instinctive  sympathy  greater  than  the  Greek  would 
have  dared  to  acknowledge.  He  is  fiery,  untamed,  revenge- 
ful, answering  taunt  with  taunt.  In  the  Prometheus  of  Shel- 
ley, all  that  can  lessen  our  sympathy  is  removed.  The 
strength  remains,  but  the  bitterness  has  vanished,  merged  in 
an  all-embracing  pity.  The  Titan  of  ^Eschylus  exclaims  :  — 


nPOMHGETS.  . 

L.  975-    <*7r^-(?  Xoyo>  TOV?  TravTa 

ocrot  Tra^dvTCs  eu  KO.K.OVOL  fi   CK&LK 


EPMHS. 
W  <r'  eyoj  /KC/X^VOT'  ou  oyxiKpav  voVov.1 


i  PROMETHEUS. 

I  tell  thee,  I  loathe  the  universal  gods, 
Who  for  the  good  I  gave  them  rendered  back 
The  ill  of  their  injustice. 

HERMES. 

Thou  art  mad  — 
I  hear  thee  raving,  Titan,  at  the  fever-height 


124  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

HPOMHeETS. 
vocroi/x'  av,  ei  v6<Tr)p.a  TOUS  e^Opov^  (rrvyeiv. 

Shelley's  Prometheus  no  longer  "  loathes  the  universal  gods." 

He  says :  — 

I  hate  no  more 
As  then,  ere  misery  made  me  wise. 

Yet,  in  spite  of  this  new  magnanimity,  the  Titan  of  Shelley 
has  fully  as  much  of  fine  scorn  and  legitimate  defiance  as  the 
Titan  of  yEschylus.  Compare  Shelley,  I.  401-406,  with^Es- 
chylus,  937-940. 

Let  others  flatter  Crime,  where  it  sits  throned 
In  brief  omnipotence :  —  secure  are  they,  .  .  . 

I  wait, 

Enduring  thus,  the  retributive  hour, 
Which,  since  we  spake  is  even  nearer  now. 

<T€/?ov,  Trpocrev^ov,  Qunrrf.  rov  Kparowr'  dei'. 
fp.ol  8'  eAaoxrov  Z^vos  17  /x/tySev  /xeXci 
SpaVo),  KpaTetVo)  roVSe  TOV  ftpa^yv 
OTTWS  OeXu'  Sapov  yap  OVK  ap^ei 

We  may,  if  we  like,  conceive  the  hero  of  the  later  drama 
to  be  the  same  as  the  hero  of  the  earlier,  disciplined  by 

PROMETHEUS. 

If  it  be  madness  to  abhor  my  foes, 
May  I  be  mad ! 

1    Reverence  thou, 

Adore  thou,  flatter  thou,  whomever  reigns, 
Whenever  reigning  —  but  for  me,  your  Zeus 
Is  less  than  nothing !    Let  him  act  and  reign 
His  brief  hour  out,  according  to  his  will  — 
He  will  not,  therefore,  rule  the  gods  too  long ! 


PR  OME  THE  US    UNB  0  UND.  1  25 

aeons  of  pain.  Or,  we  may  say  that  Shelley  selected  the 
noblest  elements  alone  in  the  Prometheus  of  ^Eschylus,  and 
developed  these  elements  into  a  grand  and  harmonious  con- 
ception. For  there  are  very  noble  suggestions  in  the  elder 
Prometheus.  Calm  and  dignified  lines  succeed  outbursts  of 
tempestuous  hate,  affecting  us  like  still  water  after  angry  seas. 
The  Prometheus  sung  by  Shelley  is  he  who  is  hailed  by  lo,  — 

L.  613.          (o  KOIVOV 


Almost  we  may  say  that  the  Prometheus  of  ^Eschylus  is 
the  parent  of  two  widely  differing  conceptions  :  the  Satan  of 
Milton,  and  the  Prometheus.  of  Shelley.  In  Milton,  the  glory 
is  even  more  dimmed  than  in  ^Eschylus  by  hate  and  scorn  ; 
in  Shelley,  the  nobler  elements  have  conquered,  and  the 
Titan  is  proud  indeed,  but  pure  from  evil  taint 

Not  only  the  conception  of  Prometheus,  but  the  whole 
conception  of  the  drama  is  in  Shelley  touched  to  modern- 
ness.  This  is  especially  evident  in  the  relation  between 
Prometheus  and  Asia.  The  broken  yet  ideal  communion 
between  Man  and  the  Spirit  of  Nature  was  unthought  of 
by  the  Greek.  The  use  made  by  Shelley  of  the  idea  in 
the  old  myth,  that  Jupiter  derived  all  his  power  from  Pro- 
metheus, subserves  in  an  interesting  way  Shelley's  peculiar 
philosophy,  and  gives  us,  in  place  of  the  external  tyrant 
of  ^Eschylus,  a  mere  emanation  from  the  human  mind.  In 
^Eschylus,  salvation  is  to  be  wrought  by  submission  and 
compromise  ;  in  Shelley,  by  revolution  and  by  love.  The 

1    O  common  Help  of  all  men,  known  of  all, 
O  miserable  [or  enduring]  Prometheus. 


126  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

central  fact  of  the  Prometheus  Bound,  as  of  every  Greek 
drama,  is  'Avay*?;  —  Necessity. 

L.  105.       TO  T^S  avayKTjs  «?OT'  dSrjpiTov  aQivos. 

In  spite  of  the  intellectual  fatalism  of  Shelley,  the  central 
thought  of  the  English  drama  is  freedom,  —  man's  control 
over  his  own  destiny.  Finally,  the  whole  spiritual  idea  is  far 
clearer  in  Shelley's  mind  than  in  the  mind  of  ^Eschylus. 
We  instinctively  feel,  in  the  Prometheus  Bound,  either  that 
the  poet  conceals  from  his  hearers  an  esoteric  truth,  which 
he  dares  to  suggest  by  dark  hints  only,  or  else  that  he  is 
himself  held  in  the  grasp  of  a  conception  greater  than  he 
fully  understands.  In  Shelley,  the  rebellious  note  is  in  no 
wise  suppressed.  We  feel  him  to  be  in  full  possession  of  his 
own  thought,  and  if  the  thought  is  obscure  to  us,  the  fault 
does  not  lie  with  the  poet. 

The  direct  comparisons  between  the  two  dramas  are 
naturally  confined  in  the  main  to  the  first  act  of  Shelley, 
as  this  is  the  only  part  which  repeats  in  any  degree  the  sit- 
uation of  JEschylus.  The  scene  here  is  much  the  same, — 
the  high  mountain-wall,  the  nailed  Titan,  the  ocean  spread 
below.  We  know  how  profoundly  Shelley's  imagination  was 
affected  by  the  setting  of  the  Prometheus  Bound ;  we  know 
also  that  shortly  before  writing  his  own  drama  he  had  been 
travelling  among  the  finest  scenery  of  the  Alps  and  of  North- 
ern Italy.  He  writes,  in  his  journal,  March  26,  1818:  — 
"  After  dinner  we  ascended  Les  Echelles,  winding  along  a 
road  cut  through  perpendicular  rocks,  of  immense  elevation. 
.  .  .  The  rocks,  which  cannot  be  less  than  a  thousand  feet 
in  perpendicular  height,  sometimes  overhang  the  road  on 
each  side,  and  almost  shut  out  the  sky.  The  scene  is  like 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  127 

that  described  in  the  Prometheus  of  ^Eschylus  :  —  vast  rifts 
and  caverns  in  the  granite  precipices  ;  wintry  mountains 
with  ice  and  snow  above  ;  the  loud  sounds  of  unseen  waters 
within  the  caverns,  and  walls  of  toppling  rocks,  only  to  bo 
scaled  as  he  describes,  by  the  winged  chariot  of  the  ocean 
nymphs."  Reminiscences  of  the  Alps  and  of  ^Eschylus  meet 
in  the  scenery  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound. 

The  passive  elements  introduced  in  the  description  of  the 
scene  are  the  same,  —  the  vast  height,  the  remoteness  and 
desolation.  Compare  with  Shelley,  I.  1-23. 


L.        I.    x^ovos  P*v  c's  TrjXovpov  -rjKOfJiev  irfSov 
^KvOrjv  es  oifiov,  afiarov  €is  eprjfJ-Lav.1 

L.     2O.  .  .  .  airavdpwirta  7rayo> 

iv  oure  (fxavrjv  ovrt  TOV  p,op(J3r]v  /Bp 
oi/'ei.2 

L.  270.    .  .  .  fprjp.ov  TovB'  dyctVovos  ?rayou.3 
L.  141.  .. 


<f>povpav  a 


1  We  reach  the  utmost  limit  of  the  earth, 
The  Scythian  track,  the  desert  without  man. 

2  ...  this  rocky  height  unclomb  by  man, 
Where  never  human  voice  nor  face  shall  find 
Out  thee  who  lov'st  them  ! 

8  Doomed  to  this  drear  hill,  and  no  neighboring 
Of  any  life. 

*  Transfixed  with  the  fang 

Of  a  fetter,  I  hang 

On  the  high-jutting  rocks  of  this  fissure,  and  keep 
An  uncoveted  watch  o'er  the  world  and  the  deep. 


128  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

L.  157-    v^v  ^  aWepiov  KiwyfJ.'  6  roXa? 


L.  113.    inraidpios  Seoyioio-i  Trao-o-aXevros  a»v.2 
L.  269.  .  .  .  Trpos  Trerpais  7rcSap<r«xs.3 

See  also  lines  four  and  five. 

L.     1  5  .  ...  <f>dpayyi  Trpos  8va-^eifj.epw 

L.    562.  ...  XttXlVOlS  fV  TTfTplVOLCTlV 

^«/ 
L.     22.    ... 


Compare  Shelley  I.  383-5  :  — 

.  .  .  whether  the  Sun 

Split  my  parched  skin,  or  in  the  moony  night 
The  crystal-winged  snow  cling  round  my  hair. 

Shelley's   "  crystal-winged  "    snow   finds   exact  parallel   in 
s'  "  XcvKOTrrepo)  vi<£a8t  "  (993). 

1  But  now  the  winds  sing  through  and  shake 
The  hurtling  chains  wherein  I  hang,  — 
And  I,  in  my  naked  sorrows,  make 
Much  mirth  for  my  enemy. 

3  Hung  here  in  fetters,  'neath  the  blanching  sky  ! 

3  ...  against  such  skiey  rocks. 

4  ...  up  this  storm-rent  chasm. 

6  And  who  is  he  that  writhes,  I  see, 
In  the  rock-hung  chain? 

6  ...  thy  beauty's  flower, 
Scorched  in  the  sun's  clear  heat,  shall  fade  away. 


PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  129 

It  is,  however,  noticeable,  that  in  Shelley  we  find  constant 
references  to  the  snow,  —  avalanches,  icy  peaks  glittering  in 
the  sunlight,  etc.,  and  that  such  references  are  with  one  or 
two  exceptions  unknown  in  ^Eschylus.  The  difference  is 
probably  due  to  the  different  character  of  the  scenery  in 
Switzerland  arid  in  Greece.  It  may  be  suggested  in  passing 
that  if  the  student  wishes  to  feel  the  absence  of  color  in 
Greek  poetry,  he  cannot  do  better  than  to  turn  from  the 
Prometheus  of  ^Eschylus  to  the  Prometheus  of  Shelley. 

The  active  elements  in  the  setting  are  often  the  same,  — 
the  earthquake,  the  vulture,  the  wind  and  whirlwind  (Shelley, 
1.34-44;  ^Eschylus,  1016-1025,  1085-1089).  Sometimes 
the  English  here  seems  like  a  mere  transcription  of  the 
Greek ;  Shelley  would  hardly  have  called  the  vulture 
"winged  hound,"  had  not  ^Eschylus  used  the  expression, 
TTV^VOS  Kv<av.  There  are  one  or  two  other  descriptive  pas- 
sages in  the  poem  in  which  the  Greek  is  very  closely  fol- 
lowed. Compare  ^Eschylus, 

L.  23.  .  .  .  dfr/xevo)  8«  (roi 

rj  Trot/aXet/iGJV  vv£  air 
Trd\vr)V  6'  f<£av  17X105 

with  Shelley, 

Act  I.,  L.  44.  And  yet  to  me  welcome  is  day  and  night 

Whether  one  breaks  the  hoar  frost  of  the  morn, 
Or  starry,  dim,  and  slow,  the  other  climbs 
The  leaden-coloured  east; 

1  Night  shall  come  up  with  garniture  of  stars 
To  comfort  thee  with  shadow,  and  the  sun 
Disperse  with  retrickt  beams  the  morning-frosts. 


130  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 


also  ^Eschylus, 

L.    IO43.     7T/30S  TdVr'   €7T*  e/XOl   pLTTTfCrOw  }J.(.V 


8' 


Ppovrrj  (r<f>a.K£\<t>  T   d 

X#dva  8'  ex  Trufyievwv  avrais  pt£ais 

KpaScuvoi, 

8e  TTOVTOU  rpa^ei  poQita 
eiev  TWV  T'  oupaviW 
acrr/owv  SioSovS;  .  .  .l  % 
with  Shelley, 
ActI.,L.  165.  ...  the  sea 

Was  lifted  by  strange  tempest,  and  new  fire 
From  earthquake-rifted  mountains  of  bright  snow 
Shook  its  portentous  hair  beneath  Heaven's  frown; 
Lightning  and  Inundation  vexed  the  plains. 

In  spite  of  these  close  parallelisms,  the  difference  in  the 
treatment  of  the  scene  is  very  marked  in  the  two  dramas. 
The  modern  attitude  towards  nature  is  evident  in  Shelley, 
both  in  the  greater  fulness  and  detail  of  treatment  and  in 
the  greater  spirituality  of  conception.  The  austere  and 
bleak  simplicity  of  ^schylus  is  as  effective  in  its  way  as  the 
brilliant  word-painting  of  Shelley;  yet  the  modern  poet 

l  Let  the  locks  of  the  lightning,  all  bristling  and  whitening, 

Flash,  coiling  me  round  ! 
While  the  aether  goes  surging  'neath  thunder  and  scourging 

Of  wild  winds  unbound  ! 
Let  the  blast  of  the  firmament  whirl  from  its  place 

The  earth  rooted  below, 
And  the  brine  of  the  ocean  in  rapid  emotion, 

Be  it  driven  in  the  face 
Of  the  stars  up  in  heaven,  as  they  walk  to  and  fro! 


PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  131 

gives  us  some  details  which  we  could  ill  afford  to  miss,  as 
v/here  the  plain  iron  chains  of  the  Greek  are  transformed 
into  vast  and  glittering  glaciers,  which  bind  the  Titan  to  the 
rock.  But  it  is  noticeable  that  although  the  physical  setting 
is  elaborated  by  Shelley,  it  is  on  the  whole  less  emphasized 
than  in  yEschylus.  Shelley  passes  the  different  elements  of 
the  physical  torture  in  rapid  summary  in  the  first  monologue, 
and  then  escapes,  for  the  remainder  of  the  act,  into  the 
region  of  purely  spiritual  pain.  We  feel  indeed  that  through 
every  line  spoken  by  the  Titan  of  ^Eschylus  there  breathes 
the  pain  of  rebellion,  the  primary  and  simple  passion  of 
angry  pride  ;  but  no  passage  is  found  remotely  suggestive  of 
such  complex  and  exalted  sources  of  suffering  as  are  opened 
to  Prometheus  by  Shelley's  Furies ;  and  hardly  any  causes 
of  inward  pain  are  directly  stated,  though  the  "scorn"  and 
"despair"  of  Shelley  are  faintly  suggested  in  such  passages  of 
yEschylus  as  98-114,  544-551,  152-159.  The  climax  of 
agony  in  the  Greek  is  the  outburst  of  the  rage  of  the  elements 
at  the  very  end  of  the  drama.  The  Greek  drama,  as  com- 
pared with  the  English,  is  certainly  external. 

Turning  away  from  the  general  consideration  of  the  scene 
to  the  closer  search  for  parallel  passages  in  the  dramatic 
development,  we  find  at  once  that  the  opening  invocation  of 
Shelley  is  almost  a  direct  translation  from  the  Greek.  Com- 
pare Shelley,  I.  25-29, 

"  I  ask  the  Earth,  have  not  the  Mountains  felt? 
I  ask  yon  Heaven,  the  all-beholding  Sun, 
Has  it  not  seen?    The  Sea,  in  storm  or  calm,  .„,, 

Heaven's  ever-changing  shadow,  spread  below, 
Have  its  deaf  waves  not  heard  my  agony?  ^^ 

Ah  me,  alas,  pain,  pain  ever,  for  ever." 


132  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

with  ^Eschylus, 

L.  88.    <3  Sios  aldrjp  Kal  Ta^virrfpoi  Trvoa.1 

TTOTO.fJi£)V  T£  TTrjyal,   TTOVTLWV  TC  KV/JiaTtDV 

avypiO(J.ov  yeAaayxa,  Tra/i^ro/j  TC  yi}, 

Kttl  TOV  TTaVOTTTfjV  KVK\OV  T^XtOV  KoA.U>  * 

i8f.crOf.  fi*  ota  Trpos  6f£)v  Tracr^w 

***** 
<^>ei;  (j>fv,  TO  Trapbv  TO  T   CT 


This  is  the  "  large  invocation  "  which,  as  Lanier  says, 
"  seems  still  to  assault  our  physical  ears,  across  the  twenty 
odd  centuries." 

No  other  broad  parallel  occurs  till  we  reach  the  Curse 
uttered  by  the  Phantasm  of  Jupiter.  There  is  no  one  pas- 
sage in  ^Eschylus  corresponding  to  this  Curse,  nor  is  there 
the  same  stern  assertion  that  evil  is  of  necessity  self-doomed  ; 
but,  in  several  great  passages,  we  have  the  spirit  of  parts  of 
the  Curse  perfectly  reproduced.  With  the  first  stanza,  and 
part  of  the  second,  compare  lines  989-996. 

KUTfi  ov§€  fj.ifj^avr)(J.'  ,  OTCO 
i  /AC  Zeus  yeytonjcrat  raSe,2 

1  O  holy  ^Ether,  and  swift  winged  Winds, 
And  River-wells,  and  laughter  innumerous 
Of  yon  sea-waves  !     Earth,  mother  of  us  all, 
And  all-viewing  cyclic  Sun,  I  cry  on  you  !  — 
Behold  me  a  god,  what  I  endure  from  gods  ! 

****#* 
Woe,  woe  !  to-day's  woe  and  the  coming  morrow's, 
I  cover  with  one  groan. 

2  No  torture  from  his  hand, 
Nor  any  machination  in  the  world 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  133 


irplv  av  -xaXavBrj  Seoywi.  Av/uavri/pta. 
Trpos  ravra  pMrr«r0ft>  /u,ev  ai0aAovoxr 
Cpa)  Se  n<£a8i  Kai  ftpovnjfuun 
KUKoYa)  TTaVra  Kai  Tapaoxrerw  ' 
yva.fJi.il/ei  yap  ovSev  roivSe  /u,'  wore  Kai 
Trpos  ou  xpcciv  viv  CKTreereiv  rvpavvi'Sos. 

This   imprecation  finds  sublime  fulfilment  in  the  great 
closing  passage,  1080-1093. 

/cat  /oir/v  Ipya)  KOVK  Irt  fj.v@<p 


ta  8'  i7xa>  Trapa/iuKaTat 
,  e\i»ces  8'  CKAa 


crKipra  8'  dve/Atuv  Trvf.vfJua.Ta 

C(9  aAAi/Xa 

crracriv  dvrwrvow  aTroSei/cvv/xcva 


Shall  force  mine  utterance,  ere  he  loose,  himself, 
These  cankerous  fetters  from  me  !     For  the  rest, 
Let  him  now  hurl  his  blanching  lightnings  down, 
And  with  his  white-winged  snows,  and  mutterings  deep 
Of  subterranean  thunders,  mix  all  things, 
Confound  them  in  disorder  !     None  of  this 
Shall  bend  my  sturdy  will,  and  make  me  speak 
The  name  of  his  dethroner  who  shall  come. 

1  Ay  !  in  act,  now  —  in  word,  now,  no  more  ! 

Earth  is  rocking  in  space  1 

And  the  thunders  crash  up  with  a  roar  upon  roar, 
And  the  eddying  lightnings  flash  fire  in  my  face,  i5 

And  the  whirlwinds  are  whirling  the  dust  round  and  round, 
And  the  blasts  of  the  winds  universal,  leap  free 
And  blow  each  upon  each,  with  a  passion  of  sound, 


134  PROMETHEUS  UNBOUND. 


£uvT£TapaKTcu  8'  alOrfp  TTOVTO). 
TotaS'  CTT'  ffjioi  pnrt)  SioOcv 


to  fir)rpo<i  C/AT^S  cre/3as,  w 
aWrjp  KOLVOV  </>aos  «A.i'cr<ra>v, 
eo-opas  ju.'  ws  eKSt/ca 


The  "  manifest  dread,"  —  rc^ovo-a  <^>o/3ov,  —  like  the  "  frenzy- 
ing  fear"  in  Shelley,  is  a  note  seldom  struck  by  the  brave 
Titan. 

The  last  stanza  of  the  Curse  has  a  fine  parallel  in  lines 
915-919  of  ^Eschylus,  describing  the  Fall  of  Jupiter. 

Act  I.,  L.  296-301. 

An  awful  image  of  calm  power, 

Though  now  thou  sittest,  let  the  hour 

Come,  when  thou  must  appear  to  be 

That  which  thou  art,  internally, 
And  after  many  a  false  and  fruitless  crime, 
Scorn  track  thy  lagging  fall  thro'  boundless  space  and  time. 

L.  915.  •  •  •  Tpos  Tavra  vvv 

OapfrCiv  Ka6r)cr9u>  TOIS  TreSapcri'ois  KTVTTOIS 

7TIOTOS,   TLV(L<T(T(aV  X6/30"'  TTVpTTVOOV 


And  aether  goes  mingling  in  storm  with  the  sea  ! 
Such  a  curse  on  my  head,  with  a  manifest  dread, 
From  the  hand  of  your  Zeus  has  been  hurtled  along  ! 
O  my  mother's  fair  glory  !     O,  .(Ether,  enringing 
All  eyes,  with  the  sweet  common  light  of  thy  bringing, 

Dost  thou  see  how  I  suffer  this  wrong? 

1  Now,  therefore,  let  him  sit 
And  brave  the  imminent  doom,  and  fix  his  faith 
On  his  supernal  noises,  hurtling  on 
With  restless  hand,  the  bolt  that  breathes  out  fire. 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  135 

ovSev  yap  aura)  raw'  C7rapK€o-«  TO  fir}  ov 
Treo-etv  aTt/xws  Trrw/xar'  ov/c  dvao-^CTa. 

The  closest  parallelism  in  situation  in  the  dramas  is  found 
in  the  colloquy  which  each  contains  between  Hermes  and 
Prometheus.  In  each,  Hermes  is  sent  from  Zeus  to  extort 
the  Secret  known  to  the  Titan,  or  to  inflict  fresh  tortures ;  in 
each,  he  is  treated  with  scorn  and  his  offers  ignominiously 
thrown  back.  The  form  of  this  discussion  more  nearly 
approaches  the  form  of  the  Greek  drama  than  does  anything 
else  in  Shelley,  the  two  speakers  answering  each  the  other 
in  brief  sententious  phrases.  This  sharp  repartee  is  a 
favorite  form  in  Greek  drama :  it  is  quite  out  of  Shelley's 
usual  line,  yet  he  here  uses  it  with  great  force  and  effect. 
One  or  two  passages  in  the  dialogue  are  similar  rather  in 
thought  than  in  form  :  — 

Act  I.,  L.  429.   Pity  the  self-despising  slaves  of  Heaven, 

Not  me,  within  whose  mind  sits  peace  serene, 
As  light  in  the  sun,  throned :  .  .  . 

L.  966.    rfjs  ays  Xarpetas  TJJV  ffJ.r)v  8wnrpa£iav, 
(ra<f>u><;  ciria'Tacr ',  OVK  av  dAAa^at/i'  lyia. 
Kptlcraov  yap  oi/xai  ri^Se  AaTpeueiv  Trerpa 
•rj  Trarpl  <ftvvai  Zrjvl  TTICTTOV  ayyeXov.1 

Yet  the  spirit  of  the  two  scenes  is  on  the  whole  widely 
different.  The  Mercury  of  Shelley  is  well-disposed  towards 

For  these  things  shall  not  help  him,  none  of  them, 
Nor  hinder  his  perdition  when  he  falls 
To  shame,  and  lower  than  patience. 

1  I  would  not  barter  —  learn  thou  soothly  that !  — 
My  suffering  for  thy  service.     I  maintain 
It  is  a  nobler  thing  to  serve  these  rocks 
Than  live  a  faithful  slave  to  father  Zeus. 


136  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

Prometheus,  and  regretful  and  courteous  in  address;  the 
Hermes  of  ^Eschylus  is  a  flippant  and  cruel  young  God. 
The  part  played  by  Shelley's  Mercury  is  much  more  nearly 
approached  by  Oceanus  in  the  Greek  drama  who  tempts  the 
Titan  by  seeming  friendliness,  while  yet  he  is  too  weak  cour- 
ageously to  take  his  part.  Hephaestus,  again,  mourns,  like 
Mercury,  that  it  falls  to  his  share  to  inflict  suffering  on  Pro- 
metheus. Compare  Shelley, 

Act  I.,  L.  352.  .  .   .  Awful  Sufferer, 

To  thee  unwilling,  most  unwillingly 
I  come,  by  the  great  Father's  will  driven  down, 
To  execute  a  doom  of  new  revenge. 
Alas  !  I  pity  thee,  and  hate  myself 
That  I  can  do  no  more, 
with  ^Eschylus, 

L.  14.    eyw  8'  aroX/Aos  elfju  crvyyevf)  Oeov 

S^crai  /?ia  (fxipayyt  Trpos  Svcr^et/Ae/aw. 

8"  avayKr)  roiivSe  /xot  roA/iav  crxeOf.lv 

yap  Trarpos  Xoyous  /3apv. 
TTJ<;  6pOo(3ov\ov  ®€//,i8 
a/covra  cr  aKwv  8i)o-Avrots 


and  with  a  later  exclamation  of  Hephaestus  as  he  still  hesi- 
tates before  his  cruel  task, 
L.  45.    w  TroAAa  [U(rr]&ei<Ta. 


1  1  lack  your  daring,  up  this  storm-rent  chasm 
To  fix  with  violent  hands  a  kindred  god, 
Howbeit  necessity  compels  me  so 
That  I  must  dare  it,  —  and  our  Zeus  commands 
With  a  most  inevitable  word.     Ho,  thou  ! 
High-thoughted  son  of  Themis  who  is  sage, 
Thee  loth,  I  loth  must  rivet  fast  in  chains. 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  137 

As  he  completes  that  task  and  gazes  upon  the  Sufferer's 
form,  Hephaestus  cries  to  Kratos  :  — 


L.  69.       opas  Oeapa.  Svcrdearov 

It  is  with  like  horror  and  pity  that  Mercury  describes  his 
haunting  memory  of  that  vison. 

L.  357.  ...  aye  from  thy  sight 

Returning,  for  a  season,  Heaven  seems  Hell, 
So  thy  worn  form  pursues  me  night  and  day, 
Smiling  reproach. 

The  stern  lines  of  dialogue  (I.  411-416),  which  declare 
that  the  "  years  to  come  of  pain  "  are  limited  only  by  "  the 
period  of  Jove's  power,"  buH;  that  this  end  of  tyranny  "  must 
come,"  suggest  passages  of  similar  form  and  content  IP 
yEschylus,  755-770,  507-520.  Thus  :  — 

HPOMHeETS. 

L-    755*      V^V  ^  OvBfV  €<TTl  TCpfJM  fJiOL 

}  Trplv  av  Zeus  tKireay 


yap  TTOT'  ccrriv  CKTretreiv  apx?)?  Aia  /  2 


1  Thou  dost  behold  a  spectacle  that  turns 
The  sight  o'  the  eyes  to  pity. 

2  PROMETHEUS. 
.  .  .  but  I  before  me  see 
In  all  my  far  prevision,  not  a  bound 
To  all  I  suffer,  ere  that  Zeus  shall  fall 
From  being  a  king. 

10. 

And  can  it  ever  be 
That  Zeus  shall  fall  from  empire? 


138  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

nPOMHGETS. 
tos  TOU/VV  OVTWV  ToivSe  croi  fJuaOtiv  Trapa. 

While  already,  in  solemn  words  which  "  half  reveal  and  half 
conceal"  the  mysterious  decree  of  Fate,  Prometheus  has 
made  known  to  the  Chorus  that  even  Zeus  shall  bend  to 

Necessity. 

XOPOS. 

L.  515.    TIS  ow  avayxiys  eVriv  oiaKO<rrpo<£os  / 

nPOMH9ETS. 
Tpi/iop<£oi,  /AVT^oves  T' 


XOPOS. 
TOVTWV  apa  Zeus  ecmv  a<r^ev€crTepos. 

HPOMHeETS. 
OVKOW  av  €K^>vyoi  ye  T^V 


XOPOS. 
TI  yap  TreirptoTai  Zr/vi,  TrA^y  dec  Kpareiv  ;  1 


PROMETHEUS. 
Learn  from  me,  therefore,  that  the  event  shall  be. 

i  CHORUS. 
Who  holds  the  helm  of  that  Necessity? 

PROMETHEUS. 
The  threefold  Fates,  and  the  unforgetting  Furies. 

CHORUS. 
Is  Zeus  less  absolute  than  these  are? 

PROMETHEUS. 

Yea, 
And  therefore  cannot  fly  what  is  ordained. 

CHORUS. 

What  is  ordained  for  Zeus,  except  to  be 
A  king  for  ever? 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  139 

HPOMHeETS. 
TOVT   OUK  IT'  av  irvdoio, 


With  the  coming  of  the  Furies,  we  enter  another  set  of 
associations.  There  is  nothing  like  this  in  the  Prometheus 
Bound  :  but  in  two  other  plays  of  ^schylus  —  the  Choe- 
phorse  and  the  Eumenides  —  we  have  a  suggestive  and  hor- 
rible picture  of  these  "  hounds  of  Hell."  It  is  evident  that 
Shelley  must  have  been  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  Greek 
conception  of  the  Erinyes.  His  Furies,  like  those  of  yEschy- 
lus,  are  sable-stoled  daughters  of  Night  ;  they  rise  from  Hell 
in  evil  throngs,  their  locks  are  snaky,  they  track  their  victim 
like  hounds,  they  feel  fierce  joy  in  the  pursuit.  The  picture, 
in  the  Eumenides,  of  Apollo,  young,  grave,  gracious,  sternly 
reproaching  the  hideous  forms  and  protecting  his  suppliant 
Orestes,  suggests  at  once  Shelley's  Mercury,  the  fair  god,  as 
he  holds  back  the  forms  of  darkness  and  forces  them  to 
crouch  in  silence  at  his  bidding.  The  transition  from  the 
Chorus  of  Furies  to  the  Chorus  of  healing  spirits,  at  the  end 
of  the  first  act  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound,  is  no  more 
marked  than  the  transition  in  the  Eumenides  when  the 
Furies  appear  as  protecting  divinities  of  Athens,  and  their 
hymns  to  Athens  and  to  Freedom  relieve  the  horror  of 
the  drama.  Yet  the  contrast  between  the  workings  of 
the  Greek  imagination  and  the  English  could  not  be  more 
sharply  marked  than  by  comparing  the  Furies  of  yEschylus 
with  those  of  Shelley,  —  the  "troop  of  hideous  women,"  wing- 
less, gross,  physical,  who  lie  in  disgusting  sleep  in  the  temple 

PROMETHEUS. 

'Tis  too  early  yet 
For  thee  to  learn  it  :  ask  no  more. 


140  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

of  Apollo,  with  the  shadowy  forms  of  spiritual  evil,  who 
sweep  upward  from  the  horizon, 

Blackening  the  birth  of  day  with  countless  wings, 
And  hollow  underneath,  like  death. 

^Eschylus  leaves  nothing  to  the  imagination ;  Shelley  leaves 
all  but  everything. 

The  only  other  part  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound  where 
Shelley  has  obviously  and  consciously  followed  ^Eschylus  is 
in  the  long  passage  of  the  second  act  where  Asia  describes 
to  Demogorgon  the  service  which  Prometheus  has  rendered 
to  man.  Compare  Shelley,  II.  iv.  32-99,  with  ^Eschylus, 
196-254,  442-471,  476-506.  This  enumeration  of  bene- 
fits bestowed  comes  more  gracefully  from  the  lips  of  Asia 
than  from  those  of  the  Titan  himself ;  but  Shelley  has  fol- 
lowed ^Eschylus  very  closely.  Prometheus  has  given  men 
fire,  has  taught  them  to  build,  in  ^schylus  houses,  in 
Shelley  cities,  to  sail  the  ocean  in  "winged  chariots,"  and 
to  discover  the  mineral  treasures  of  the  earth.  He  has 
trained  them  in  medicine,  in  astronomy,  in  the  knowledge 
of  science,  letters,  and  art,  though  by  ^Eschylus  the  last 
gift  is  only  hinted  in  the  gift  of  Memory,  the  "sweet 
Muse-mother."  Shelley  omits  the  ^Eschylean  passage  con- 
cerning the  reading  of  omens.  The  modern  and  ancient 
poets  unite  in  assigning  to  Prometheus  the  glory  of  awaken- 
ing Hopes  within  the  human  breast ;  but  in  ^schylus  the 
Hopes  are  blind,  while  in  Shelley  they 

hide  with  thin  and  rainbow  wings 
The  Shape  of  Death. 

Finally,  Shelley  adds  to  hope,  Love  —  a  gift  unmentioned 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  141 

by  the  Greek.     The  two  passages  should  be  carefully  com- 
pared. 

These  are  perhaps  all  the  points  worth  mentioning  in 
which  Shelley  shows  direct  and  conscious  recollection  of  the 
Prometheus  Bound.  But  this  enumeration  by  no  means 
exhausts  the  influence  of  the  Greek  drama  upon  the  English. 
For  when  one  mighty  imagination  comes  within  the  sphere  of 
another,  countless  unconscious  influences  pass  from  spirit  to 
spirit.  The  temper  and  style  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound  are 
^Eschylean.  We  realize  at  once  how  completely  the  genius 
of  ^Eschylus  had  dominated  Shelley,  if  we  compare  the  ex- 
alted and  severe  grandeur  of  many  parts  of  the  drama  with 
the  tremulous  and  sensitive  style,  most  native  to  Shelley's 
genius,  found  in  such  poems  as  the  Lines  in  the  Euganean 
Hills.  The  Greek  drama  also  affects  the  English  in  an 
exquisite  way,  through  what  we  may  call  pictorial  suggestion. 
A  poet's  imagination  deals  primarily,  not  with  intellectual 
abstractions,  but  with  pictures,  and  it  is  evident  that  Shelley's 
mind  was  filled  and  possessed  by  the  mere  images  of  Pro- 
metheus Bound.  There  is  no  likeness  in  the  place  held  by 
lo  and  by  Asia :  yet  surely  the  picture-elements  in  lo's  story 
helped  to  create  the  story  of  Asia.  The  vision  of  a  Wander- 
ing was  in  Shelley's  mind, — of  a  woman,  questioning  a  silent 
figure,  wise  with  foreknowledge  of  fate,  then  passing  onward 
on  her  way.  lo,  like  Asia,  is  stirred  and  troubled.  Aroused 
by  visions  of  the  night,  she  fares  forth  on  a  wide  journey. 
As  lo  questions  Prometheus,  Asia  questions  Demogorgon. 
In  many  other  ways  we  seem  to  trace  this  same  force  of 
suggestion  at  work,  though  we  may  not  penetrate  with"  too 
assured  a  step  the  secret  workings  of  the  poet's  imagination. 
Shelley  had  seen,  through  the  eyes  of  ^Eschylus,  a  troop  of 


142  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

Sea-nymphs,  winging  their  way  upward  from  the  void,  and 
dropping  on  the  cliff  beside  the  Titan  (^Eschylus,  115-135)- 
He  gives  us  a  Vision  of  Furies,  winged  shadows,  sweeping 
from  the  horizon  toward  the  Titan's  rock  :  and  again,  as 
the  storm  disperses,  he  sees  a  fairer  band.  Delicate- 
winged, 

A  troop  of  spirits  gather 
Like  flocks  of  clouds  in  Spring's  delightful  weather. 

Many  minor  suggestions  are  to  be  found  —  some  of  pictures, 
some  of  thoughts,  some  of  mere  form  and  sound  of  words. 
By  the  English  refrain  of  sorrow,  we  may  set  a  Greek 
line  :  — 

S.,   I.    L.  23.  Ah  me  !  alas,  pain,  pain  ever,  for  ever  ! 
A.,  L.  98,  99.   <J>ev  <f>£v,  TO  irapov  TO  T*  ci 


And  the  Greek  might  be  called  a  paraphrase  of  the  articu- 
lated groan  of  the  English.  There  is  a  chorus  in  vEschylus 
(396-435)  which  wails  with  reiterated  moaning,  sounding 
the  changes  in  every  possible  way  on  the  word  ore'vo)  ;  and 
something  of  the  same  echoing  sorrow  is  heard  through  two 
snatches  of  earth-chorus  in  Shelley,  I.  107-111,  306-311, 
where  the  word  "misery,"  repeated  over  and  over,  gives 
a  like  effect  of  lamentation. 

"  Peace  is  in  the  grave,"  cries  Prometheus,  when  the  Furies 
have  released  him  :  — 

I  am  a  God,  and  cannot  find  it  there. 

lo  passionately  calls  on   Death  ;   and  Prometheus  with 
calm  majesty  replies  :  — 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  143 


L.  752.      j]  8uo-7T£Tu>s  av  TOVS  e/iovs  aOXows 

OTtt)  tfaVtlV  jU,€V  IcTTlV  Ol  TTCTTpdifJievOV. 

yap  rjv  av  -n-^fiaToiv  aTraXXayij.1 


Compare  also,  in  ^Eschylus,  lines  933,  1053.  The  thought 
of  the  nature  and  self-inflicted  suffering  of  the  tyrant  is  the 
same. 

To  know  nor  love,  nor  friend,  nor  law,  to  be 

Omnipotent  but  friendless,  is  to  reign, 

cries  Asia  :  and  Prometheus  says  of  the  Zeus  of  ^Eschylus  :  — 

L.    224.        €V€(TTL  ydp  7TWS  TOVTO  Trj 

vo&rj/JM,  TOIS  </>iAoio-i  fj.r) 
When  Shelley  tells  us  the  Spirits  of  the  Mind 

Inhabit,  as  birds  wing  the  wind, 
Its  world-surrounding  aether, 

we  remember  the  musical  phrase  of  ^Eschylus  (281),  aWepa 
ayvov  Tropov  oiwvwv,  "  holy  aether,  path  of  birds." 
Compare  also  the  following  passages  :  — 

Shelley,   I.     140-143,    with /Eschylus,        311-314 


I  377! 

I IOO2-I 


375-379.  i  377.  37» 

1002-1006 
114-119,   "    "       228-238 


1  Verily, 

It  would  be  hard  for  thee  to  hear  my  woe, 
For  whom  it  is  appointed  not  to  die. 
Death  frees  from  woe. 

2  For  kingship  wears  a  cancer  at  the  heart,  — 
Distrust  in  friendship. 


144                         PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND. 

Shelley,       I.                     5  3  1  with  /Eschylus, 

687-695 

"                        617,618        "         « 

740-746 

"        II.        i.        29,  30        "          " 

144,  H5 

"                  iv.         15,  16        "          " 

397-401 

«      III.       ii.       42'49)     ,<         „ 

21,  22  J 

138-140 

iv.            141        "         " 

r  671,672 

(.682 

"      IV.                 93-95       "        " 

r  442-45° 
1  546-550 

NOTES. 


SHELLEY'S   PREFACE. 

See  Mrs.  Shelley's  Note  on  the  drama  for  an  enlargement  of  the 
statements  concerning  Shelley's  aim  and  conception  contained  in  the 
Preface;  and  see  a  letter  written  by  the  poet  to  his  friend  Peacock, 
March  23,  1819,  for  a  wonderful  description  of  the  Baths  of  Caracalla, 
mentioned  in  the  text,  where  the  drama  was  composed.  Many  of  the 
letters  written  to  Peacock  from  Italy  have  touches  of  description  clearly 
showing  whence  the  inspiration  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound  was 
derived. 


ACT   I. 

11.  1-73.  This  first  great  soliloquy  of  Prometheus  is  full  of  Miltonic 
echoes.  In  the  union  of  austere  and  elevated  simplicity  with  a  certain 
splendor  of  effect,  the  blank  verse  is  singularly  like  that  of  Paradise 
Lost. 

1.  g.    Eyeless  in  hate.    The  clause  modifies  "  thou  "  in  the  next  line. 

1.  30.  Ah  me  !  a/a:,  etc.  The  first  notable  example  of  an  irregular 
line,  though  other  minor  instances  have  already  occurred.  The  stu- 
dent should  carefully  trace  all  metrical  irregularities,  great  and  small, 
in  the  poem,  and  should  consider  their  artistic  effect.  Shelley's  varia- 
tions on  the  schematic  line  are  one  of  the  chief  sources  of  his  musical 
power. 

1.  31.  The  crawling  glaciers.  The  detail  of  these  lines  strikingly 
enhances  the  horror  of  the  opening  picture.  The  glaciers,  catching 
reflections  of  the  moon  in  their  icy  points,  are  the  chains  which  bind  the 
vast  form  of  the  Titan  to  the  rock.  A  stupendous  image  is  thus  sug- 

145 


146  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  I. 

gested  of  the  scale  of  the  picture,  and  the  duration  of  Prometheus' 
torture. 

1.  34.  Heaven's  -winged  hound.  The  only  reference  in  the  drama 
to  the  vulture  of  the  ancient  myth.  Shelley  discards  much  of  the  old 
machinery  of  torture.  He  begins,  it  is  true,  with  the  material  sublime 
and  the  suggestion  of  physical  agony;  almost  at  once,  however,  he 
passes  to  the  more  subtle  torture  of  the  spirit.  See  Lanier,  Develop- 
ment of  the  Novel,  Chapter  V,  for  an  unsympathetic  attack  on  the  set- 
ting of  the  drama. 

1.  48.    The  wingless,  crawling  hours.    Cf.  II.  i.  1 6. 

1.  54.  Thro1  the  wide  Heaven.  Forman  thinks,  though  with  no  au- 
thority, that  "  the  "  should  be  omitted. 

1.  74.  Thrice  three  hundred.  The  controlled  sadness  of  the  solilo- 
quy of  Prometheus  is  relieved  by  the  more  impassioned  horror  of  these 
Voices  of  Nature,  just  as  the  even  movement  of  the  blank  verse  is 
relieved  by  the  swift,  free  movement  of  the  lyrics. 

l.ioS.  Cried '' Misery  !'  then.  "  The  convulsion  of  terror  is  obviously 
natural ;  but  wherefore  the  cry  of  '  Misery '  when  the  curse  smote  the 
fell  tyrant  of  Earth  and  Heaven,  and  predicted  his  fall?"  —  JAMES 
THOMSON. 

1.124.  Why  scorns  the  spirit.  There  is  alienation  between  the  Earth 
and  Prometheus.  The  old  earth-mother  speaks  to  him  with  an  "  in- 
organic voice,"  which  can  but  convey  dim  suggestions  of  a  shrouded 
meaning.  Once,  blessed  with  the  fellowship  of  Asia,  the  Anima  Mundi, 
the  communion  between  man  and  nature  has  been  complete :  it  is  so 
no  longer.  Man,  tortured  and  unredeemed,  seeks  in  vain  to  understand 
the  language  of  nature.  Cf.  a  like  alienation  beautifully  rendered  in 
Mrs.  Browning's  Drama  of  Exile,  where  the  Earth-Spirits  reproach 
Adam  and  Eve  that  their  sin  has  separated  nature  from  man. 

1.  137.  And  love.  How  cursed  I  him  ?  The  subject  of  "  love  "  is  of 
course  "  I  "  (1. 136);  but  the  statement  seems  a  little  vague  and  weak. 
Rossetti  proposes  an  ingenious  emendation  :  "  And  Jove  —  how  cursed 
I  him?"  Forman  speaks  of  the  "stagey  abruptness"  of  this  reading; 
Mr.  Swinburne  also  rejects  it,  but  says  that  it  gives  us  "a  reasonable 
reading  in  place  of  one  barely  explicable." 

1.  195.  For  know,  there  are  two  worlds.  An  obscure  passage.  Per- 
haps it  is  foolish  to  seek  for  an  adequate  explanation  of  this  strange 


ACT  I.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  147 

underworld,  and  we  may  best  ascribe  the  fancy  to  the  lingering  love  of 
magic  which  so  bewitched  Shelley's  boyhood.  The  sphere  of  Memory, 
of  the  Imagination,  of  Platonic  archetypes,  is  vaguely  suggested. 

1.  222.  My  wings  are  folded.  In  these  exquisite  lyrics,  the  first 
poetry  of  pure  beauty  in  the  drama,  we  meet  for  the  first  time  the 
sister-spirits,  lone  and  Panthea,  whose  presence  soothes  the  austere 
agony  of  the  Titan.  lone  is  the  forward-looking  spirit  of  Hope; 
Panthea  is  the  spirit  of  insight  into  the  universal  divine,  which,  how- 
ever Shelley  would  have  shrunk  from  the  word,  we  may  best  describe 
as  Faith. 

1.  240.  Why  have  the  secret  powers.  There  is  a  fine  nemesis  in  thus 
causing  the  Phantasm  of  Jupiter  to  repeat  the  curse.  Evil  is  self- 
condemned;  it  pronounces  its  own  doom. 

1.  292.   Heap  on  thy  soul.    Cf.  Milton,  Paradise  Lost,  I.  211 :  — 

"  The  will 

And  high  permission  of  all-ruling  Heaven 
Left  him  at  large  to  his  own  dark  designs, 
That  with  reiterated  crimes,  he  might 
Heap  on  himself  damnation." 

This  Curse  is  simply  the  statement  of  the  inexorable  law  by  which 
cause  works  out  to  effect. 

1.  303.  It  doth  repent  me.  In  "  the  superiority  of  the  mind  over  its 
own  darker  passions  "  implied  in  Prometheus'  recantation  of  the  Curse, 
Mr.  Rossetti  sees  "  the  beginning  of  the  fall  of  Jupiter  and  the  unbind- 
ing of  Prometheus."  "  Prometheus  can  expel  from  the  very  essence 
of  his  being  the  passions  of  hatred  and  revenge  ...  he  can  discover 
Jupiter  to  be  an  imposture,  and  can  pity  instead  of  hating  him;  and 
then  Jupiter  will  sink,  an  impotent  and  innocuous  bubble,  upon  the 
tide  of  eternity.  Shelley  exhibits  to  us  the  human  mind  at  this  stage." 
We  must  remember  that  Jupiter  derives  all  his  power  from  Prometheus. 
Rossetti  regards  him  as  the  anthropomorphic  God,  created  by  the 
mind  of  man,  and  tyrannizing  over  its  creator;  but  surely  the  myth  is 
quite  as  much  political  as  theological.  See  Introduction. 

1.  306.  Misery,  Oh  misery.  From  the  order  of  natural  law,  with  its 
unfailing  nemesis,  Prometheus  has  escaped  into  the  higher  or"der  of 
forgiveness.  The  Earth,  with  merely  natural  understanding,  feels  that 
he  who  forgives  is  vanquished. 


148  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  i. 

1.  313.  Fallen  and  vanquished.  We  have  here  the  first  instance 
of  the  ethereal  chorus-voices  which  sound  through  the  poem  and 
enhance  the  vastness  of  the  action  by  suggesting  the  mysterious  sym- 
pathy of  all  creation.  "  The  world  in  which  the  action  is  supposed  to 
move  rings  with  spirit- voices;  and  what  these  spirits  sing  is  melody 
more  purged  of  mortal  dross  than  any  other  poet's  ear  has  caught, 
while  listening  to  his  own  heart's  song,  or  to  the  rhythms  of  the 
world."  —  SYMONDS. 

1.  314.  Fear  not.  Notice  throughout  the  different  functions  of  the 
two  attendant  spirits.  lone,  the  embodiment  of  Hope,  is  first  to  see. 
She  beholds,  describes,  and  questions.  Panthea,  the  brooding  spirit  of 
Faith,  interprets.  Cf.  I.  579-590;  II.  iv.  404-410;  IV.  30-40,  185-190. 

1.  340.  The  hope  of  torturing  him.  Note  the  horrible  dramatic 
appropriateness  of  the  simile,  on  the  lips  of  Fury.  All  the  figures  used 
in  connection  with  the  Furies  should  be  noted. 

1.  382.  I  gave  all  He  has.  "  This  Jupiter,  the  '  Prince  of  this  world,' 
the  embodiment  of  tyranny,  false  religion,  evil  custom,  is,  in  his  most 
familiar  form,  '  the  letter  that  killeth '  —  authority,  orthodoxy,  the 
petrified  dogma,  which  hinders  the  play  of  free  thought  ...  as  Prome- 
theus is  '  the  spirit  that  giveth  life.' "  —  TODHUNTER. 

1.  431.  Not  me,  within  whose  mind  sits  peace  serene.  Cf.  Comus, 
372,373:  — 

"  Virtue  could  see  to  do  what  virtue  would 
By  her  own  radiant  light,  though  sun  and  moon 
Were  in  the  flat  sea  sunk." 

Also  the  Faerie  Queene,  I.  ii.  12:  — 

"  Virtue  gives  herself  light,  through  darkness  for  to  wade." 

1.  442.  Blackening  the  birth  of  day.  The  horrible  formlessness  of  the 
Furies  has  both  an  aesthetic  and  a  symbolic  value.  Cf.  lines  465-470. 

1.  484.  Thou  think? st  we  will  live  thro1  thee.  This  passage  sug- 
gests the  nearest  approach  to  the  consciousness  of  Sin  to  be  found  in 
the  drama. 

1.  540.  The  pale  stars  of  the  morn.  Here  begins  the  central  Agony 
of  Prometheus.  The  Furies  tear  asunder  the  veil  that  separates  present 
from  future,  and  reveal  to  the  Titan,  hanging  upon  his  cliff,  visions  of 


ACT  i.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  149 

the  two  central  tragedies  (as  conceived  by  Shelley)  of  the  world's  his- 
tory. The  first  Vision  is  of  the  Crucifixion  of  Christ;  the  second,  of 
the  French  Revolution.  The  sting  of  the  torture  is  found  in  the  sug- 
gestion that  these  great  events,  however  much  of  heroism  and  self- 
sacrifice  they  imply,  resulted  in  injury  rather  than  benefit  to  humanity. 
The  Furies,  spirits  of  negation,  instead  of  seeing  a  soul  of  goodness  in 
things  evil,  see  a  soul  of  evil  in  all  things  good. 

1.  542.  Dost  thou  faint,  mighty  Titan  ?  The  Furies  tempt  Pro- 
metheus to  despair  by  suggesting  that  the  aspiration  he  has  awakened 
in  man  is  a  curse  rather  than  a  blessing  because  destined  to  remain 
forever  unfulfilled.  This  attitude  towards  aspiration  is  that  of  the 
pessimist.  It  marks  much  of  our  modern  poetry,  from  Arnold  to 
Swinburne,  but  finds  a  noble  converse  in  the  message  of  Browning. 
Cf.  with  these  lines  Swinburne,  in  the  Atalanta  in  Calydon :  — 

"  Thou  hast  given  man  sleep,  but  smitten  sleep  with  dreams, 
Saying  'joy  is  not,  but  love  of  joy  shall  be." 
Thou  hast  made  sweet  springs  to  all  our  pleasant  streams, 
In  the  end  thou  hast  made  them  bitter  with  the  sea." 

See  also  William  Blake's  Human  Abstract. 

1.  584.  Alas  !  I  looked  forth  twice.  Faith  and  Hope  veil  their  faces, 
and  Prometheus  endures  unaided. 

1.  619.  In  each  human  heart.  It  is  notable  that  this  climax  of  the 
torture  is  expressed  in  dull  blank  verse,  and  consists  in  a  simple  state- 
ment of  commonplace  fact.  Is  there  an  artistic  error  here? 

1.  673.  From  unremembered  ages.  As  the  Furies  turn  all  good  into 
evil,  so  these  gentle  Spirits  of  the  Human  Mind  bring  consolation  by 
singing  that  all  evil  is  the  occasion  for  higher  good.  The  first  sings  of 
Courage  even  in  defeat;  the  second  of  Self-sacrifice,  impossible  if 
suffering  were  not.  The  third  and  fourth  chant  of  Wisdom  and  Imagi- 
nation, the  two  powers  of  hope. 

1.  708.  Which  begins  and  ends  in  thee.  Eg.  "  in  the  powers  and 
constitution  of  the  human  mind."  —  ROSSETTI. 

1.  738.  On  a  poefs  lips  I  slept.  This  exquisite  little  lyric  has  .been 
called  the  fullest  expression  of  poetic  idealism.  It  calls  to  mind  at 
once  many  passages  from  the  poems  of  Emerson. 

1.  753-   Behold 'st  thou   not  two  shapes.     The   lyrics  which  follow 


150  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  11. 

are  "  dainty  but  obscure."  It  is  clear  at  least,  however,  that  these  two 
spirits  bring  the  healing  power  of  Sympathy.  Like  the  Furies,  they 
fully  recognize  the  evil  in  the  world;  unlike  the  Furies,  they  do  not 
gloat  over  it,  but  lament  it.  The  consolation  offered  Prometheus  has 
no  unreal  element;  it  never  transcends  the  limits  of  truth. 

1.  805.    The  responses.     Often  so  accented  by  Shelley.    Cf.  II.  i.  171. 


ACT  II.    SCENE  I. 

1.35.  Pardon,  great  Sister  !  "  Panthea  is  the  perpetual  messenger 
of  love  between  Prometheus  and  his  divine  consort,  as  Faith  is  between 
the  genius  of  man  and  its  ideal.  .  .  .  Shelley  has  here  made  English 
blank  verse  the  native  language  of  elemental  genii." — TODHUNTER. 

1.  62.  But  in  the  other.  This  is  the  Dream  of  Fulfilment.  The  mys- 
tical poetry  suggests  the  time  when  Faith  shall  be  lost  in  sight,  as  Pan- 
thea feels  her  being  absorbed  in  the  life  of  Prometheus. 

1.  68.  At  his  feet  I  slept.  When  do  these  dreams  come  to  Panthea? 
If  we  attempt  to  observe  consistent  chronology  we  must  say,  during  the 
Temptation  of  Prometheus;  and  it  is  beautiful  to  think  that  even  while 
Humanity  surfers  most,  Faith  is  visited  by  fair  visions  of  its  future  tri- 
umph. Yet  Panthea  does  not  seem  asleep  during  this  period,  though 
she  hides  her  eyes.  She  looks  forth  twice  at  least.  After  all,  the 
drama  takes  place  in  that  spiritual  region  where  ideas  of  succession  cam 
not  enter.  "  Its  date  is  of  course  in  an  ideal  aeon,  beyond  the  range  of 
chronology,  unimpeached  by  anachronism,  so  that,  notwithstanding  the 
antiquity  of  the  dramatis  persona  and  fable,  the  catastrophe  points  to 
a  far  apocalyptic  future,  and  the  allusions  to  the  most  recent  discoveries 
of  science  are  just  as  much  in  place  as  those  to  prehistoric  traditions." 
—  JAMES  THOMSON. 

1.  83.  And  like  the  vapours.  The  similes  drawn  from  Nature  through- 
out this  wonderful  scene  should  be  collected  and  carefully  studied. 
The  close  and  minute  accuracy  of  Shelley's  observation  will  become  no 
less  apparent  than  his  sensitiveness  to  the  poetry  of  nature. 

1.  119.  There  is  a  change.  Only  in  the  eyes  of  Faith,  can  Love  be- 
hold the  vision  of  Humanity  triumphant. 

1.  131.    Follow  !  follow !     From  the  point  of  the  appearance  of  the 


SCENES  I., ii., in.]     PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  151  ' 

Dream  of  Progress  to  the  end  of  the  scene  Nature  becomes,  as  it  were, 
progressively  spiritualized.  In  the  first  soliloquy  of  Asia,  its  marvellous 
loveliness  is  still  external  if  not  sensuous;  but  in  the  latter  part  of  the 
scene,  Shelley's  Hegelian  conception  of  the  gradual  evolution  of 
spiritual  consciousness  in  the  natural  world  finds  free  symbolic  expres- 
sion. 

1.  141.  As  you  speak.  First  nature,  then  faith,  voice  the  same  sum- 
mons. 

1.  166.  Echoes  we:  listen!  These  Echoes  are  of  course  spiritual 
nature-voices,  undefined :  not,  as  Todhunter  strangely  conjectures,  the 
voice  of  primeval  Hope,  or  lone,  lingering  in  the  craggy  caverns  of 
the  world. 

SCENE  II. 

These  lyrics  can  be  compared  to  nothing  in  the  range  of  English 
poetry  except  Keats's  Ode  to  a  Nightingale.  They  are  not  only,  how- 
ever, nature-poems :  they  have  a  symbolic  meaning  which  can  be 
neglected  when  they  are  enjoyed  away  from  their  connection,  but 
which  adds  to  their  interest  when  the  drama  is  taken  as  a  whole.  Love 
and  Faith  are  pursuing  their  journey  through  all  human  experience : 
and  first  they  pass  through  the  sphere  of  the  Senses,  or  external  life 
(Semichorus  I.) ;  then  through  that  of  the  Emotions  (Semichorus  II.) ; 
finally,  through  that  of  the  Reason  and  the  Will  (Semichorus  III.). 

1.2og.  The  path  thro1 -which.  The  interwoven  rhyme-scheme  should 
be  traced  by  the  student,  that  one  source  of  the  linked  sweetness  of  the 
lyric  may  be  understood. 

1.258.  And -wakes  the  destined.  Shelley's  fatalism,  the  doctrine  under- 
lying this  lyric,  rather  injures  the  poetry,  rendering  it  obscure  and 
abstruse.  The  "  fatal  mountain  "  is  probably  that  to  which  Panthea 
and  Asia  are  advancing,  and  where  we  find  them  at  the  beginning  of 
the  next  scene. 

1.  278.  /  have  heard  those.  This  passage  is  a  perfect  little  fairy-tale 
in  itself.  Indeed,  the  whole  dialogue  of  the  Fauns  is  like  a  pastoral 
interlude. 

SCENE  III. 

Is  the  dawn  in  which  we  here  find  ourselves  that  of  the  first  or  ,the 
second  day?  According  to  Thomson,  it  is  impossible  to  ascertain. 


152  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

Perhaps  the  journey  of  Asia  and  Panthea  has  lasted  through  twenty- 
four  (dramatic)  hours;  perhaps  it  has  taken  place  in  a  moment  of 
time.  Thomson  thinks  that  the  scene  in  the  Cave  of  Demogorgon,  the 
overthrow  of  Jupiter  and  the  transfiguration  of  Asia,  all  occur  in 
the  darkest  hour  of  the  night,  just  before  the  dawn.  There  are  some 
expressions  which  seem  to  bear  out  this  theory;  yet  it  is  hard  to  think 
of  the  descent  into  Demogorgon's  Cave,  and  the  colloquy  between  him 
and  Asia  as  occupying  all  day  and  the  greater  part  of  the  night.  See 
note,  II.  iv.  557.  There  may  be  one  sunrise,  or  two,  or  three.  The  first, 
in  the  Indian  vale;  the  second,  here;  the  third,  replaced  by  Asia's 
transfiguration,  Scene  V.  But  the  position  taken  by  the  present  writer 
is  that,  whatever  obscure  time-intimations  may  be  found,  Shelley's  inten- 
tion was  to  fix  the  mind  on  central  points  in  the  sequence  of  the  one 
great  cosmic  day.  See  Introduction. 

1.  316.  Fit  throne  for  such  a  Power  !  "  Here  Asia  speaks  rather  as  a 
mortal  maiden  might  than  in  her  own  character."  — TODHUNTER. 

1.  341.  Hark  !  the  rushing  snow  !  With  this  superb  avalanche,  com- 
pare another,  equally  fine,  in  Browning's  Saul :  — 

"  Have  ye  seen  when  Spring's  arrowy  summons  goes  straight  to  the  aim, 
And  some  mountain,  the  last  to  withstand  her,  that  held  (he  alone, 
While  the  vale  laughed  in  freedom  and  flowers)  on  a  broad  bust  of  stone 
A  year's  snow  bound  about  for  a  breastplate,  —  leaves  grasp  of  the  sheet? 
Fold  on  fold  all  at  once  it  crowds  thunderously  down  to  his  feet, 
And  there  fronts  you,  stark,  black,  but  alive  yet,  your  mountain  of  old, 
With  his  rents,  the  successive  bequeathings  of  ages  untold." 

1.  348.  Look  how  the  gusty  sea.  Suspense  and  gradual  suggestion  are 
admirably  used  in  this  passage  to  prepare  us  for  a  great  event. 

1.  359-  To  the  deep,  to  the  deep.  We  have  left  the  phenomenal 
world  behind  us,  and  are  on  the  heights  of  pure  mysticism,  whence  we 
are  to  be  carried  downward  to  the  abysses  of  absolute  being  "  where 
there  is  one  pervading,  one  alone."  This  descent  of  Asia  recalls  Faust's 
descent  to  the  Mothers,  in  the  second  part  of  Faust. 

1.  399.  Such  strength  is  in  meekness.  These  lines  make  it  clear  that 
Asia  is  not  only  a  spectator,  but  an  agent  in  the  redemption  of  human- 
ity. The  power  of  Demogorgon  can  be  set  free  only  when  Love  has 
attained  to  utter  self-abnegation. 


SCENE  iv.]    '         PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  153 

SCENE  IV. 

1.  405.  /  see  a  mighty  darkness.  The  treatment  of  Demogorgon  can- 
not be  called  a  great  nor  a  consistent  success;  yet  it  is  by  a  fine  tour 
de  force  that  Shelley  makes  us  feel,  even  as  clearly  as  he  does,  the 
presence  of  a  spirit  which  is  described  entirely  by  negations. 

1.  415.  Who  made  that  sense.  These  exquisite  lines  are  deficient  in 
grammatical  construction.  Rossetti  changes  "  when  "  to  "at."  Forman 
suggests  "  hear  "  for  "  or." 

1.  431.  He  reigns.  The  slight  variations  in  Demogorgon's  answers 
to  these  questions  should  be  carefully  noted. 

1-  435-  There  was  the  Heaven.  This  long  passage,  with  its  reminis- 
cences of  the  traditional  Golden  Age,  and  its  picture  of  a  highly 
elaborate  civilization,  seems  somewhat  inconsistent  with  the  general 
tenor  of  the  myth;  yet  it  corresponds  to  Shelley's  idea  of  Jupiter,  as 
the  petrifaction  of  the  earlier  customs  and  faith  of  primitive  humanity 
into  rigid  and  tyrannous  law. 

1.  503-  Who  rains'  down.  It  is  doubtful  whether  this  word  should 
be  "  reigns  "  or  "  rains  " :  the  two  readings  give  very  different  sense. 
The  reading  here  adopted  is  that  of  Mrs.  Shelley  and  of  Rossetti. 
Does  Asia  ask  the  origin  of  Evil  or  the  ultimate  Power  of  the  universe? 

1.5I7-  If  the  abysm.  The  punctuation  here  given  is  that  of  Ros- 
setti's  edition. 

1.  523.  But  eternal  Love.  This  line  and  a  half  is  the  quiet  state- 
ment in  abstract  ferms  of  the  central  theme  elsewhere  expressed 
through  glowing  symbol.  The  message  is  the  same  as  that  of  Tenny- 
son, who  begins  his  In  Memoriam  with  the  invocation,  — 

"  Strong  Son  of  God,  Immortal  Love." 
It  is  the  same  as  that  of  Browning,  who  exclaims :  — 

"  Love,  which  on  earth,  amid  all  the  shows  of  it 
Has  ever  been  known  the  sole  good  of  life  in  it, 
That  love,  ever  growing  here,  spite  of  the  strife  in  it 
Shall  arise,  made  perfect,  from  Death's  repose  of  it." 

Yet  the  thought  of  Shelley  stops  short  of  the  thought  of  the  Victorian 
poets,  in  that  to  him  Love  remains  simply  a  universally  diffused  and 
abstract  emotion,  while  to  them  it  is  embodied  in  a  Personality. 


154  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  n. 

1.  532.  The  rocks  are  cloven.  This  marvellous  picture  of  color  and 
light  in  motion  could,  as  all  critics  agree,  have  been  adequately  rendered 
only  by  the  pencil  of  William  Blake.  Mr.  Walter  Crane  has  an  interesting 
attempt  to  render  the  scene.  He  gives  the  impression  of  speed  and  of 
forms  born  of  the  viewless  wind,  but  misses  the  impression  of  beauty. 

1.  557.  Watch  its  path  among  the  stars.  These  lines,  and  the  pre- 
ceding 1.  537,  lend  plausibility  to  the  theory  that  we  are  in  the  depth  of 
night,  and  that  many  hours  have  elapsed  since  Asia  and  Panthea  were 
swept  downward  to  the  abode  of  Demogorgon.  The  student  should 
consider  the  problem  in  the  light  of  passages  like  II.  v.  587;  III.  ii.  85, 
123.  The  passages  in  the  present  scene  may  be  easily  understood  and 
the  imaginative  power  of  the  scene  heightened,  if  we  conceive  Asia  and 
Panthea  gazing  upward  to  the  sky  through  darkness  so  profound  that 
the  stars  are  revealed  even  in  the  morning  light.  This  phenomenon  is 
frequently  seen  in  mines. 

SCENE  V. 

1.  578.  On  the  brink.  A  sense  of  breathless  speed  is  imparted  by 
the  break  in  this  lyric  and  the  swift  change  of  scene,  as  well  as  by  the 
abrupt  omission  of  the  last  line  in  the  concluding  stanza. 

1.  587.  The  sun  will  rise  not.  A  bit  of  Shelleyan  mysticism,  incon- 
sistent with  the  general  progress  of  the  cosmic  day  (cf.  II.  i.),  but 
suggestive  of  the  suspension  of  mere  physical  light  in  the  presence  of 
the  Light  of  Love. 

1.  589.  As  the  aerial  hue.  The  figure  recalls  one,,curiously  similar  in 
I.  465;  yet  as  in  that  the  beauty  enhanced  horror  by  contrast,  so  here 
it  enhances  beauty  by  likeness  —  thus  illustrating  two  great  principles 
of  aesthetics. 

1.  597.  The  Nereids  tell.  See  various  versions  of  the  Birth  of  Aph- 
rodite :  in  particular  Chaucer's  Knightes  Tale,  Tennyson's  Princess,  and 
Swinburne's  Hymn  to  Proserpine  :  — 

"  The  statue  of  Venus,  glorious  for  to  see 
Was  naked,  fletyng  in  the  large  sea; 

A  citole  in  hire  right  hond  hadde  sche, 
And  on  hire  heed,  ful  semely  for  to  see 
A  rose  garland  fresh  and  wel  smellyng, 
Above  hire  heed  her  dowves  flikeryng." 


SCENE  v.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  155 

..."  lovelier  in  her  mood 
Than  in  her  mould  that  other,  when  she  came 
From  barren  deeps  to  conquer  all  with  love; 
And  down  the  streaming  crystal  dropt;  and  she 
Far-fleeted  by  the  purple  island-sides, 
Naked,  a  double  light  in  air  and  wave, 
To  meet  her  Graces,  where  they  decked  her  out 
For  worship  without  end." 

"  Not  as  thine,  not  as  thine  was  our  mother,  a  blossom  of  flowering  seas — 
Clothed  round  with  the  world's  desire  as  with  raiment,  and  fair  as  the  foam, 
And  fleeter  than  kindled  fire,  and  a  Goddess,  and  mother  of  Rome  — 
For  thine  came  pale,  and  a  maiden,  and  sister  to  sorrow ;  but  ours 
Her  deep  hair  heavily  laden  with  odour  and  colour  of  flowers, 
White  rose  of  the  rose-white  water,  a  silver  splendour,  a  flame, 
Bent  down  unto  us  that  besought  her,  and  earth  grew  sweet  with  her  name. 
For  thine  came  weeping,  a  slave  among  slaves,  and  rejected;  but  she 
Came  flushed  from  the  full-flushed  wave,  and  imperial,  her  foot  on  the  sea, 
And  the  wonderful  waters  knew  her,  the  winds  and  the  viewless  ways, 
And  the  roses  grew  rosier,  and  bluer  the  sea-blue  stream  of  the  bays." 

1.  629.  In  those  looks.  "  What  Shelley  meant  by  the  mazes  of  looks, 
Mr.  Garnett  explains  by  reference  to  II.  i.  114-117.  A  still  better  illus- 
tration is  to  be  found  in  Shelley's  letter  of  April  6,  1819,  to  Peacock, 
where  he  says  of  the  Roman  beauties,  '  The  only  inferior  part  are  the 
eyes,  which  though  good  and  gentle,  want  the  mazy  depth  of  colour 
behind  colour  with  which  the  intellectual  women  of  England  and  Ger- 
many entangle  the  heart  in  soul-inspiring  labyrinths.'  "  —  FORMAN. 

1.  632.  Thro1  the  vest  which.  A  reading  which  has  no  authority,  but 
which  commends  itself  to  the  musical  ear,  makes  the  line  run  as 
follows :  — 

"  Thro'  the  veil  that  seems  to  hide  them." 

With  this  great  lyric  should  be  carefully  compared  Shelley's  Hymn  to 
Intellectual  Beauty.  And  again  a  poet  utterly  remote  from  Shelley  in 
form  —  Emerson  —  is  in  closest  sympathy  with  his  mystic  idealism. 

1.649.  My  soul  is  an  enchanted  boat.  A  fragment  of  1817  is  a  study 
for  the  first  lines  of  this  lyric.  The  lyric  is  hard  to  understand..  "  It 
has  been  read  by  many  of  us  scores  of  times  with  scarcely  a  wish  per- 
haps to  trace  out  its  intricate  meaning,  but  with  a  keen  delight  in  its 
ideal  charm,  its  supersensuous  meander."  "  The  soul,  transported  into 


156  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  m. 

idealism  by  melody,  muses  upon  the  indefinable  possibilities  of  existence 
prcenatal  and  prseterlethal  —  the  world  of  spirit  before  birth  and  after 
death."  —  ROSSETTI.  The  poem  suggests  the  passage  of  the  weary 
nature  back  through  age,  maturity,  youth,  and  childhood,  till  it  enters 
the  eternal  sphere. 

This  scene  of  the  Apotheosis  of  Asia  recalls  to  us  the  Marriage  Feast 
in  the  first  book  of  the  Faerie  Queene,  where  Una,  having  laid  aside 
her  mourning,  comes  forth  in  silver-white,  and  dazzles  all  men  by 

"  The  blazing  brightness  of  her  beauties'  beame, 
And  glorious  light  of  her  sunshyny  face." 

—  F.  Q.,  I.  xii.  23. 

It  recalls  also  those  far  greater  scenes  —  greater  than  anything  in 
Spenser  or  Shelley  —  where  Dante  beholds  in  Paradise  his  Lady 
Beatrice :  — 

"  Now  were  my  eyes  fixed  again  upon  the  countenance  of  my  Lady, 
and  my  mind  with  them,  and  from  every  other  interest  it  was  with- 
drawn; and  she  was  not  smiling,  but,  '  If  I  should  smile,'  she  began  to 
me,  '  thou  wouldest  become  such  as  Semele  was  when  she  became 
ashes;  for  my  beauty,  which  along  the  stairs  of  the  eternal  palace  is 
kindled  the  more,  as  thou  hast  seen  the  higher  it  ascends,  is  so 
resplendent  that,  if  it  were  not  tempered,  at  its  effulgence  thy  mortal 
power  would  be  as  a  bough  shattered  by  thunder.'  "  —  Paradiso,  XXI. 
See  also  Purgatorio,  XXX.,  XXXI. ;  Paradiso,  I.,  V.,  XIV.,  XVIIL, 
XXL,  XXIII.,  XXVI.,  XXVII.,  XXXI. 


ACT  III.    SCENE  I. 

1.  36.  Thetis,  bright  image.  "Thetis,  like  Asia  a  child  of  Ocean,  is 
her  false  counterpart.  .  .  .  She  is  a  type  of  the  false  ideal,  the  sham 
love  and  reverence  which  tyrants  exact  from  their  slaves.  .  .  .  She  is 
glory  —  the  tinsel  happiness  of  the  vain  and  selfish,  which  the  vulgar 
envy."  —  TODHUNTER. 

1.  40.  The  Numidian  seps.  The  seps  is  a  species  of  serpent  whose 
bite  entails  swift  mortification.  The  allusion  is  to  the  soldier  Sabellus, 
who,  as  is  told  in  Lucan's  Pharsalia,  IX.,  died  in  horrible  torment 
from  the  effect  of  the  bite. 


SCENES  i.,  ii.]       PR  OME  THE  US   UNB  0  UND.  157 

1.  61.  Detested  prodigy !  "It  is  in  that  sudden  reversion  of  feeling, 
that  suppression  of  any  middle  term  between  the  height  of  power  and 
the  abyss  of  destitution,  that  the  author's  dramatic  sense  appears  to  me 
to  proclaim  itself.  .  .  .  The  final  speech  of  Jupiter,  in  the  reach  of  its 
passion  and  the  awful  reserve  of  its  transition,  appears  to  me  one  of  the 
greatest  things  written  by  Shelley  —  one  of  the  great  things  of  all 
time."  —  ROSSETTI. 

1.  65.  TJiat  thou  wouldst  make  mine  enemy  my  judge.  The  same 
dramatic  effect  is  produced  by  Browning,  in  The  Ring  and  the  Book, 
under  utterly  different  dramatic  conditions,  when  the  villanous  Guido, 
who  has  murdered  his  young  wife  Pompilia,  cries  out,  as  the  execu- 
tioners come  to  lead  him  to  justice :  — 

"Abate!  Cardinal!  Christ!  Maria!  God! 
Pompilia  —  will  you  let  them  murder  me?" 

1.  72.  Even  as  a  vulture.  Shelley  is  very  fond  of  this  image.  Com- 
pare Laon  and  Cythna,  Canto  I.  Stanzas  VI.-XIV.  It  is  noteworthy 
that  the  snake  is  to  him  always  the  symbol  of  the  good  power.  Com- 
pare with  this  picture  of  the  Fall  of  Jupiter  Mrs.  Browning's  picture  of 
the  Fall  of  Lucifer  in  the  Drama  of  Exile. 

SCENE   II. 

The  effect  of  this  scene,  as  of  II.  ii.  is  that  of  an  idyllic  interlude. 
Its  calm  beauty  serves  as  relief  after  the  grandiose  horrors  of  Scene  I. 
Apollo  and  Ocean  are  the  traditional  classical  figures,  and  have  no  rela- 
tion with  Shelley's  peculiar  and  individual  myth. 

1.  87.  The  terrors  of  his  eye.  With  this  sunset-simile,  compare  a 
passage  in  Browning's  Saul,  where  a  like  illustration  is  used,  with  an 
effect  gentle  instead  of  terrible.  David  speaks  of  the  gloomy  Saul, 
whom  his  music  is  restoring  to  tenderness :  — 

"  I  looked  up,  and  dared  gaze  at  those  eyes,  nor  was  hurt  any  more 
Than  by  slow  pallid  sunsets  in  Autumn,  ye  watch  from  the  shore 
At  their  sad  level  gaze  o'er  the  ocean." 

1.  94.  An  eagle  so.  With  this  noble  description  of  an  eagle  caught 
in  the  whirlwind,  compare  Lander's  equally  noble  picture  of  the  eagle, 
serene  image  of  a  grand  and  solitary  soul :  — r 


158  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  in. 

"  Wakeful  he  sits,  and  lonely,  and  unmoved, 
Beyond  the  arrows,  views,  or  shouts  of  men; 
As  oftentimes  an  eagle,  ere  the  sun 
Throws  o'er  the  varying  earth  his  early  ray, 
Stands  solitary,  stands  immovable 
Upon  some  highest  cliff,  and  rolls  his  eye, 
Clear,  constant,  unobservant,  unabashed, 
In  the  cold  light  above  the  dews  of  morn." 

—  Count  Julian,  V.  ii. 

1.  109.   Cf.  Shelley,  Lines  on  the  Euganean  Hills,  320-326. 


SCENE  III. 

1.134.  Most  glorious.  Hercules  —  imported  from  the  old  myth  —  has 
the  slightest  possible  share  in  the  action.  Shelley  always  recognized 
reluctantly  the  part  which  brute  force  plays  in  human  life. 

1.  139.  Asia,  thou  light  of  life.  "  She  is  the  Idea  of  Beauty  Incar- 
nate, the  shadow  of  the  Light  of  Life  which  sustains  the  world  and 
enkindles  it  with  love,  the  reality  of  Alastor's  vision,  the  breathing 
image  of  the  '  awful  loveliness '  apostrophied  in  the  Hymn  to  Intel- 
lectual Beauty,  the  reflex  of  the  splendour  of  which  Adonais  was  a 
part.  .  .  .  The  essential  thought  of  Shelley's  creed  was  that  the  uni- 
verse is  penetrated,  vitalized,  made  real  by  a  spirit,  which  he  sometimes 
called  the  spirit  of  Nature,  but  which  is  always  conceived  as  more  than 
Life,  as  that  which  gives  its  actuality  to  Life,  and  therefore  as  Love 
and  Beauty.  To  adore  this  spirit,  to  clasp  it  with  affection  and  to  blend 
with  it,  is,  he  thought,  the  true  object  of  man.  Therefore,  the  final 
union  of  Prometheus  with  Asia  is  the  consummation  of  human  des- 
tinies." —  SYMONDS. 

1.  143.  There  is  a  cave,  etc.  In  this  long  description,  as  was  pointed 
out  in  the  Intioduction,  Shelley  descends  to  a  merely  pastoral  pretti- 
ness  and  betrays  something  of  the  luscious  sentimentality  which  charac- 
terized his  first  boyish  work.  It  is  almost  comprehensible  that  the 
Shelley  who  wrote  this  passage  could  have  written  those  nightmare- 
compounds  of  melodrama  and  sentiment,  Zastrozzi  and  St.  Irvyne. 

1.  157.  Ourselves  unchanged.  No  Victorian  poet,  writing  when 
science  had  revealed  the  secret  of  development,  could  have  written 
this  line  with  complacency. 


SCENE  in.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  159 

1.  173.  And  hither  come.  Lines  as  melodious  as  the  famous  ones  in 
Tennyson's  Princess :  — 

"  The  moan  of  doves  in  immemorial  elms, 
And  murmuring  of  innumerable  bees." 

Himera  and  Enna  are  towns  in  Sicily;  near  the  latter  is  the  flowery 
vale  whence  Persephone  was  carried  off  by  Dis  to  the  under  world. 

1.  184.  Whence  the  forms.  Literal  interpretation  ot  this  passage  is 
difficult,  but  it  evidently  implies  Shelley's  Platonic  idealism.  In  his  phi- 
losophy, the  only  reality  is  in  the  mind,  and  thence  proceed,  not  only 
all  the  forms  of  art,  but  the  whole  external  world.  We  remember,  in 
reading  the  passage,  how  profoundly  he  was  impressed  by  the  ancient 
statues  at  Rome. 

1.  195.    Veil  by  veil.     Man  being  entirely  passive  during  the  process. 

1.  203.  This  is  the  mystic  shell.  "  Sir  Guyon  de  Shelley,"  says  Hogg, 
"  one  of  the  most  famous  of  the  Paladins,  carried  about  with  him  three 
conches.  .  .  .  When  he  made  the  third  conch,  the  golden  one,  vocal, 
the  law  of  God  was  immediately  exalted,  and  the  law  of  the  devil 
annulled  and  abrogated  wherever  the  potent  sound  reached.  Was 
Shelley  thinking  of  this  golden  conch  when  he  described,  in  his  great 
poem,  that  mystic  shell  from  which  is  sounded  the  trumpet-blast  of 
universal  freedom?" — H.  S.  SALT.  Most  interpretations  of  this  shell 
are  painfully  arbitrary;  and  perhaps  we  may  as  well  enjoy  the  beauty  of 
the  poetry,  for  once,  without  worrying  out  a  meaning. 

1.  218.  Thy  lips  are  on  me.  A  few  lines  here  show  a  fine  exercise  of 
the  mythic  power.  If  Mother  Earth  could  speak,  such  language  would 
she  use. 

1.  246.  Death  is  the  veil.  Here  is  the  limit  at  which  Shelley  gives 
up  the  attempt  to  solve  the  final  enigmas.  He  is  very  fond  of  this 
expression.  It  occurs  again  in  one  of  his  few  sonnets;  and  on  one 
occasion,  when  he  was  nearly  drowned,  these  words  were  the  first  he 
uttered  on  regaining  consciousness. 

1.  257.  There  is  a  cavern.  Is  this  the  Cave  Prometheus  has  just 
spoken  of  ?  And  is  the  Temple  beside  it  identical  with  the  one.  men- 
tioned in  1.  294?  Seemingly  not;  but  the  confusion  is  hopeless.  Yet 
"  the  unessential  self-contradictions  and  inadvertencies  are  not  only 
pardonable  as  instances  of  the  brave  neglect  which  Pope  here  and  there 


160  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  in. 

discovered  in  Homer,  but  have  a  certain  wild  charm  of  their  own,  as 
characteristics  proving  that  in  Shelley  the  poet  and  the  man  were  one. 
We  all  know  how  conspicuous  in  his  life  was  a  sort  of  quasi-freedom 
from  the  limitations  of  time  and  space." — THOMSON. 

1.  292.  Crystalline  pool.  Often  so  accented  by  Shelley.  Cf.  Ode 
to  the  West  Wind :  — 

"  Lulled  by  the  coil  of  his  crystalline  streams." 

SCENE  IV. 

1.  314.  //  is  the  delicate  spirit.  This  spirit  has  been  likened  to 
Goethe's  Euphorion,  in  the  second  part  of  Faust,  although  of  course  it 
has  a  wider  meaning  than  the  poet-child  of  Faust  and  Helena.  The  old, 
half  inorganic  Gaia,  the  crude  material  earth,  is  replaced,  now  that  the 
harmony  of  man  and  nature  has  been  restored,  by  this  dainty  and  more 
rational  spirit,  who,  childish  at  first,  grows  into  swift  maturity  of  intelli- 
gence and  love  by  the  end  of  Act  IV. 

1.  327.  As  one  bit  by  a  dipsas.  A  kind  of  serpent  whose  bite  involved 
a  deadly  thirst. 

1.  363.  Amid  the  moonlight.  Seemingly  another  anachronism.  The 
Spirit  of  the  Earth  wanders  through  night  and  dawn,  and  returns  before 
the  Spirit  of  the  Hour,  who  yet  was  to  "  outspeed  the  sun." 

1.  418.  Pasturing  flowers.  This  very  poor  line  would  read  more 
intelligibly  were  we  authorized  to  insert  "  on  "  after  "  pasturing." 

1.  427.  Amphisbenic  snake.  A  snake  with  a  head  at  each  end,  or 
capable  of  moving  either  way. 

1.  433.  It  was,  as  it  is  still.  This  most  characteristic  line,  startling 
one  with  sudden  brightness  in  the  midst  of  a  dull  passage,  seems  to 
express  the  very  secret  of  Shelley's  nature. 

1.  472.  Thrones,  altars,  etc.  This  passage,  to  line  487,  has  been 
endlessly  discussed.  It  is  doubtless  very  obscure.  It  is  probably  best 
to  take  the  word  "  imaged  "  in  1.  481  as  a  past  tense,  with  Rossetti  and 
Forman,  instead  of  a  participle,  with  Swinburne.  The  general  sense  is 
clear:  that  the  monuments  of  our  present  civilization,  secular  and 
sacred,  will  be  to  a  regenerate  humanity  mere  memorials  of  an  outworn 
past,  as  the  monuments  of  ancient  civilization  are  to  us  to-day. 

1.  506.  Passionless ;  no.  The  punctuation  here  adopted  is  that  of 
Rossetti. 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  161 

ACT  IV. 

The  Fourth  Act  was  an  afterthought,  composed  at  Florence  a  few 
months  after  the  rest  of  the  drama.  The  action  proper  was  of  course 
concluded  with  the  end  of  the  Third  Act :  yet  we  have  had  a  conscious- 
ness throughout  that  not  only  the  immediate  personages  but  the  entire 
universe  of  living  forces  were  involved  in  the  issue;  and  the  union  of 
Prometheus  and  Asia,  as  well  as  the  general  statements  of  the  Third 
Act,  leave  us  unsatisfied.  We  demand  some  expression  of  rapture  from 
those  chorus-voices  which  have  lent  so  much  charm  to  each  stage  of 
the  poem.  The  Fourth  Act,  that  great  symphony  of  rejoicing,  where 
all  voices  of  nature  and  of  the  mind  sing  their  triumph,  is  thus  no 
arbitrary  addition,  but  an  essential  fulfilment  of  the  artistic  and  spiritual 
unity  of  the  drama. 

"  It  is  difficult  to  speak  highly  enough  of  the  fourth  act  so  far  as 
lyrical  fervor  and  lambent  play  of  imagination  are  concerned,  both  of 
them  springing  from  ethical  enthusiasm.  It  is  the  combination  of  these 
which  makes  this  act  the  most  surprising  structure  of  lyrical  faculty, 
sustained  at  an  almost  uniform  pitch  through  a  very  considerable  length 
of  verse,  that  I  know  of  in  any  literature.  One  ought  perhaps  to  except 
certain  passages,  taken  collectively,  in  Dante's  Paradiso.  These  are 
doubtless  quite  as  intense  and  quite  as  beautiful,  and  are  even  more 
moving,  as  being  blended  with  a  definite  creed,  and  the  heights  and 
depths  of  emotion,  personal  and  historical,  which  throb  along  with 
that.  Shelley's  theme  has  no  such  inner  pulse  of  association;  it 
becomes  therefore  all  the  more  arduous  and  crucial  an  attempt."  — 
WILLIAM  ROSSETTI. 

The  last  Act  is  "  the  most  sublime  hymn  ever  uttered  to  the  glory  of 
the  eternal  harmony  of  nature,  as  apprehended  by  the  human  soul  in 
communion  with  her."  —  F.  RABBE. 

The  Act  falls  into  three  great  divisions,  with  transitions  marked  by 
the  comments  of  lone  and  Panthea,  who  still  retain  their  r81e  of  inter- 
preters. In  the  first  third,  the  Hours,  past  and  future,  and  the  Spirits 
of  the  Human  Mind  join  in  joyful  choruses  of  thankful  glee.  .The 
second  part  gives  us  a  grand  antiphon  of  rejoicing  between  the  Spirit 
of  the  Earth  and  of  the  Moon.  Finally,  Demogorgon,  the  Power  no^ 
longer  of  Destruction  but  of  Life,  solemnly  invokes  dead  and  living 


162  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

spirits  to  listen  to  his  words;  and  when  in  answering  music  they  attest 
their  presence,  and  we  feel  the  harmony  of  the  redeemed  creation 
speaking  through  their  words,  he  utters  in  cadence  grave  and  serene 
his  final  message,  and  the  final  message  of  Shelley. 

1.  i.  The  pale  stars  are  gone  !  The  music  of  these  first  lyrics  is 
tripping,  delicate,  and  light  —  almost  too  light,  indeed,  if  we  fail  to 
remember  that  it  is  a  prelude  to  the  graver  harmony  that  follows. 

1.  12.  Spectres  we.  This  faint  strain  of  minor  music  leads  ex- 
quisitely into  the  glorious  fulness  of  triumphant  song.  The  literal 
mind  will  find  it  difficult  to  understand  how  Time  can  be  "  borne  to  his 
tomb  in  Eternity"  while  the  Earth  and  Moon  yet  circle  round  the 
Sun;  but  the  poetry  is  none  the  less  beautiful  because  the  symbols  are 
mixed. 

1.  54.  With  the  thunder  of  gladness.  "  Mr.  Rossetti  has  suggested 
the  substitution  of  "  madness "  for  "  gladness "  here,  to  get  a  rhyme 
instead  of  an  echo.  The  proposed  reading  has  all  to  recommend  it 
except  authority  and  necessity."  —  FORMAN. 

1.  60.  Oh,  below  the  deep.  The  broken  cadences  and  repercussive 
notes  should  be  carefully  noted  through  all  the  Act.  They  add  much 
to  the  wild  freedom  and  charm  of  the  melody. 

1.  1 1 6.  His  Dadal  wings.  A  favorite  epithet  with  Shelley.  Cf. 
III.  i.  26;  IV.  416.  These  Spirits  of  the  Human  Mind  are  of  course 
the  same  who  brought  consolation  to  Prometheus  in  Act  I.  They  "  are 
now  at  last  free  to  soar  through  all  the  universe  with  the  frank  scepti- 
cism of  children.  Compare  Walt  Whitman's  lines :  — 

"  '  O  my  brave  soul !   O  farther,  farther  sail ! 

O  daring  joy,  but  safe !   Are  they  not  all  the  seas  of  God? 
O  farther,  farther,  farther  sail." 

The  swallow-like  flight  of  these  spirits,  which  seem  to  pass  and  repass 
before  the  reader's  eyes,  gleaming,  vanishing,  and  then  gleaming  again, 
is  subtly  suggested  by  the  airy  freaks  and  changes  of  their  songs."  - 
TODHUNTER. 

1.  163.  Ceaseless,  and  rapid.  The  brief  and  irregular  song-flights 
which  we  have  had  so  far  now  merge  into  an  anapaestic  verse-move- 
ment, even  and  smooth  from  the  very  intensity  of  its  swiftness. 

1.  181.   As  the  bare  green  hill.    One  of  the  wonderfully  lovely  nature- 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  163 

vignettes,  perfect  in  a  few  lines,  which  abound  in  the  Fourth  Act. 
The  sweet  little  touch  of  earthly,  homely  beauty  affords  rest  and  relief 
after  the  spirit-music  to  which  our  ears  have  become  attuned. 

1.  186.  '  'I 'is  the  deep  music.  This  speech,  with  the  following  speech 
of  lone,  may  be  understood  to  describe  the  melody  of  the  drama. 
Study  the  difference  in  tone- color  in  the  two  speeches. 

1.  194.  But  see  where.  Through  this  description,  we  are  in  full  mys- 
ticism. Perhaps  the  grand  duet  to  follow  would  be  more  effective  if 
introduced  by  less  elaborate  machinery. 

1.  208.  By  ebbing  night.  Mr.  Thomson  points  out  that  the  epithet 
is  incorrectly  used,  and  compares  the  correct  use  in  III.  ii.  1 1 1 .  Cf . 
the  Triumph  of  Life,  79-84. 

1.  219.  White  Its  countenance.  The  intense  shining  of  these  lines 
is  wonderful. 

1.  221.  Rossetti  proposes  to  amend :  "  Its  feathers  are  as  plumes  of 
sunny  frost,"  thus  making  the  line  metrically  correct.  Perhaps  it  is 
fantastic  to  feel  a  certain  charm  in  the  hovering  movement  of  the  line 
as  it  stands. 

1.  236.  And  from  the  other.  This  mythical  vision  of  the  Earth,  with 
the  Spirit  sleeping  at  its  heart,  is  hard  to  understand,  but  marvellous 
in  suggestion. 

1.  242.  Purple  and  azure.  This  text  conforms  to  Shelley's  original 
edition,  and  to  Mr.  Swinburne's  preference,  in  omitting  the  "  and  "  in- 
serted by  Rossetti  and  Forman  between  "  white  "  and  "  green." 

1.  245.  Such  as  ghosts  dream.  A  fine  instance  of  the  tenuity  of  Shel- 
ley's imagination. 

1.  281.  Valueless.  Meaning,  of  course,  by  a  usage  common  in  Shel- 
ley, "  beyond  all  value." 

1.  282.    Crystalline.     See  note,  III.  iii.  292. 

I.  287.    The  beams  flash  on.     Shelley's  curious  cosmology,  in  the 
remainder  of  this  speech,  would  hardly  commend  itself  to  a  modern 
geologist.     According  to  him,  the  remains  of  ancient  civilizations  are 
seemingly  buried  in  the  deepest  strata  of  the  earth,  while  above  them 
lie  the  fossils  of  antediluvian  monsters,  with  behemoth  and  the  Ragged 
alligator  on  top.     But  let  us  not  be  too  literal. 

II.  319-502.    The   duet  between   Earth   and  Moon.     Who  are  th,S 
speakers?     Mr.  Forman  considers  them  to  be  the  Spirit  of  the  Earth 


164  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv. 

and  the  Spirit  of  the  Moon.  It  is  obvious  that  the  old  Gaia,  the  Earth- 
Mother  of  Act  I.,  is  not  speaking  here;  but  neither  do  these  speeches, 
with  their  masculine  tone  and  virile  music,  seem  to  come  from  the  child- 
spirit  of  the  Earth  whom  Panthea  has  just  described  so  tenderly  (261- 
268).  May  it  not  be  that  we  have  here  a  third  conception,  approaching 
to  the  conception  held  by  modern  science,  exalted  by  the  imagination  ? 
There  is  a  realism  about  the  words  of  the  Earth  which  we  do  not  find 
earlier.  Mr.  Rossetti  says :  "  On  the  whole  we  must,  I  think,  assume 
that  Earth  and  Moon  in  their  large  general  character  as  members  of 
the  solar  system  are  the  essential  speakers;  but  represented  on  the  spot 
visibly  and  emotionally  by  the  Spirit  of  the  Earth,  a  boy,  and  the  Spirit 
of  the  Moon,  an  infant  girl,  who  are  touched  into  a  sort  of  choral  con- 
sonance with  these  more  potent  entities."  James  Thomson,  with  better 
insight  says :  "  The  chanting  Earth  of  this  Fourth  Act  is  in  truth 
neither  the  mythological  Mother  nor  the  simple  child-spirit  of  the  pre- 
ceding Acts,  but,  as  was  imperative  for  the  full  development  of  the 
poet's  thought,  our  own  natural  Earth,  the  living,  enduring  root  of 
these  and  of  all  other  conceptions,  mythologic,  imaginative,  rational; 
the  animate  World-sphere  instinct  with  spirit,  personified  as  masculine 
in  relation  with  the  feminine  Moon,  as  it  would  be  no  less  rightly  per- 
sonified as  feminine  in  relation  with  the  masculine  Sun :  the  inspired 
singer,  soaring  impetuously  into  a  far  ideal  future,  casting  off  from  him 
all  in  his  first  conceptions  that  could  limit  or  impede  his  flight." 

1.  319.  The  joy,  the  triumph.  The  Love  which  is  the  theme  of  the 
drama  is  here  extended  from  Man  to  the  Universe.  The  Earth  is  mas- 
culine, the  Moon  feminine.  The  Earth  expresses  a  passionate  and 
tumultuous  triumph;  the  Moon  a  serene  yet  absorbing  joy.  The  lyrics 
of  the  two  correspond  closely  in  form,  differ  widely  in  effect.  The 
rhyme- scheme  is  the  same,  a  a  b  a  a  b,  except  that  the  Moon  gains  a 
tenderer,  more  lingering  cadence  by  a  final  line,  a  aba  abb.  The 
measure  of  the  Earth-songs  is  iambic  pentameter  (bis),  iambic  hexam- 
eter :  that  of  the  Moon-songs  just  one  foot  shorter,  e.g.  iambic  tetram- 
eter (bis),  iambic  pentameter,  ending  with  iambic  dimeter.  The 
music  of  the  earth  is  "a  deep  and  rolling  harmony";  that  of  the 
moon,  under-notes,  "  clear,  silver,  icy,  keen-awakening  tones,"  - 
echo-melody  in  a  lighter  key. 

The  punctuation  at  the  close  of  this  stanza  and  the  next  is  Rossetti's. 


ACT  iv.]  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND.  165 

1.  367.  Winged  douds.  The  poetry  of  science. 
1.  370.  It  interpenetrates.  In  the  preceding  stanza,  the  Earth  has 
expressed  its  exultation  in  the  fall  of  evil;  it  now  proceeds  to  chant 
the  glory  of  the  new  freedom  wrought  by  love.  "  Love  "  is  the  subject 
of  the  sentence  to  line  380,  and  again  of  lines  385-387.  The  punctua- 
tion is  seemingly  obscure. 

1.  394.  Man,  oh,  not  men  !  A  curious  expression,  in  which  Shelley 
seems  to  anticipate  the  socialistic  conception  of  humanity  as  a  complete 
organism  rather  than  an  aggregate  of  separate  units. 

1.  400.  Man,  one  harmonious.  The  next  four  stanzas  are  a  glorious 
paean  of  humanity.  The  first  two  stanzas  deal  with  man's  nature;  the 
last  two  with  his  power  over  art,  language,  the  natural  world.  The 
concluding  stanza  reads  like  a  prophecy,  which  the  scientific  discoveries 
during  the  fifty  years  following  Shelley's  life  went  far  to  fulfil,  but  which 
is  not  yet  accomplished  perfectly. 

1.  432.  Half  unfrozen.  In  Shelley's  own  edition,  "  half-infrozen." 
Mr.  Rossetti  adopts  Shelley's  reading. 

1.  457.  Thou  art  speeding.  Notice  the  trochees.  This  is  the  most 
wonderful  instance  of  that  use  of  scientific  fact  for  imaginative  purposes 
which  makes  the  treatment  of  nature  in  this  Act  of  the  Prometheus 
Unbound  startling  in  its  modernness.  Few  instances  of  this  peculiar 
mode  of  handling  occur  in  the  earlier  Acts;  it  almost  seems  as  if  a 
prophetic  power  had  descended  on  Shelley  as  he  wrote  of  the  future 
harmony  between  Man  and  Nature. 

1.  493.  And  the  weak  day  -weeps.  Mr.  Rossetti  assigns  these  two 
lines  to  the  Moon;  there  is,  however,  no  authority  for  the  reading,  and 
we  may  better  consider  the  passage  as  a  last  and  most  exquisite  in- 
stance of  the  free  and  broken  music  which  we  have  found  throughout 
the  drama. 

Concerning  this  duo  between  Earth  and  Moon,  M.  Rabbe,  Shelley's 
able  French  biographer,  writes :  "  Michelet  in  La  Mer  has  written 
like  a  poet  of  the  symphony  of  worlds  of  which  science  is  endeavoring 
to  read  the  score;  of  the  mathematical  relation  of  the  stars  between 
themselves,  which  are  the  harmonic  intervals  of  the  celestial  music. 
'The  Earth,'  he  says,  'in  her  tides,  greater  and  less,  speaks  to  her. 
sisters  the  planets.  Do  they  reply?  We  must  believe  they  do.  From 
their  fluid  elements  they  too  must  rise  up,  conscious  of  the  impulse  of 


166  PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  [ACT  iv.] 

the  Earth.  Mutual  attraction,  the  bent  of  each  planet  to  come  forth 
from  its  egoism,  must  be  the  cause  of  sublime  dialogues  in  the  heavens. 
Unfortunately,  the  ear  of  man  hears  but  the  least  part  of  these.' 

"  Shelley  heard  one  of  these  dialogues,  and  has  marvellously  rendered 
it  for  us  in  the  Fourth  Act  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound." 

1.  519.  Thou,  Earth.  The  grave  and  quiet  music  from  this  point  to 
the  end  reminds  us  of  the  organ-like  harmony  of  the  Ode  to  the 
West  Wind. 

1-  537-  Or  as  they.  There  is  pathos  in  this  expression  of  Shelley's 
vague  and  pantheistic  faith.  Concerning  the  future  of  man  on  earth, 
his  conviction  is  ardently  clear;  concerning  that  beyond  the  grave,  he 
can  but  suggest  a  dismal  and  meaningless  alternative. 

1.  554.  This  is  the  day.  The  concluding  lyric  of  the  drama  sur- 
prises us  by  its  soberness.  After  the  wild  rapture  of  the  central  lyrics, 
this  music  sounds  subdued  and  sad;  after  the  vision  of  redeemed 
humanity,  these  words  take  us  again,  it  seems,  into  the  world  of  con- 
flict and  pain.  It  is  better  so.  Perhaps  the  very  last  stanza,  with  its 
suggestion  of  meekness,  constancy,  and  hope  triumphant  even  in 
despair,  touches  the  highest  spiritual  level  in  the  whole  great  drama. 


EXTRACTS    FROM    CRITICISMS    ON    PRO- 
METHEUS  UNBOUND. 

[The  following  extracts  aim  to  give  the  student  some  idea  of  the  evolution  of 
criticism  on  the  drama.  There  is  an  instructive  contrast  between  the  tone  of  th4 
earlier  and  the  later  criticism.] 

"  To  our  apprehensions,  Prometheus  is  little  else  but  absolute  raving; 
and  were  we  not  assured  to  the  contrary,  we  should  take  it  for  granted 
that  the  author  was  lunatic  —  as  his  principles  are  ludicrously  wicked, 
and  his  poetry  a  melange  of  nonsense,  cockneyism,  poverty,  and  ped- 
antry."—  Literary  Gazette,  September  9,  1820. 

"  Whatever  may  be  the  difference  of  men's  opinions  concerning  the 
measure  of  Mr.  Shelley's  poetical  power,  there  is  one  point  in  regard  to 
which  all  must  be  agreed,  and  that  is  his  audacity.  ...  It  would  be 
highly  absurd  to  deny  that  this  gentleman  has  manifested  very  ex- 
traordinary powers  of  language  and  imagination  in  his  treatment  of  the 
allegory,  however  grossly  and  miserably  he  may  have  tried  to  pervert 
its  purpose  and  meaning.  But  of  this  more  anon.  In  the  mean  time, 
what  can  be  more  deserving  of  reprobation  than  the  course  which  he  is 
allowing  his  intellect  to  take,  and  that  too  at  a  time  when  he  ought  to 
be  laying  the  foundations  of  a  lasting  and  honourable  name  ?  There  is 
no  occasion  for  going  about  the  bush  to  hint  what  the  poet  himself  has 
so  unblushingly  and  sinfully  blazoned  forth  in  every  part  of  his  produc- 
tion. With  him,  it  is  quite  evident  that  Jupiter,  whose  downfall  has 
been  predicted  by  Prometheus,  means  nothing  more  than  Religion  in 
general,  that  is,  every  human  system  of  religious  belief;  and  that,  with 
the  fall  of  this,  he  considers  it  perfectly  necessary  (as  indeed  we  also 
believe,  though  with  far  different  feelings)  that  every  system  of  human 
government  also  should  give  way  and  perish.  ...  In  short,  it  is  quite 
impossible  that  there  should  exist  a  more  pestiferous  mixture  of  blas- 

167 


168  PROMETHEUS    UNBOUND. 

phemy,  sedition,  and  sensuality,  than  is  visible  in  the  whole  structure 
and  strain  of  this  poem  —  which,  nevertheless,  and  notwithstanding  all 
the  detestation  its  principles  excite,  must  and  will  be  considered  by  all 
that  read  it  attentively,  as  abounding  in  poetical  beauties  of  the  highest 
order  —  as  presenting  many  specimens  not  easily  to  be  surpassed,  of 
the  moral  sublime  of  eloquence  —  as  overflowing  with  pathos,  and 
most  magnificent  in  description.  Where  can  be  found  a  spectacle  more 
worthy  of  sorrow  than  such  a  man  performing  and  glorying  in  the  per- 
formance of  such  things?"  —  Blackwood^s,  September,  1820. 

g  "  In  Mr.  Shelley's  poetry,  all  is  brilliance,  vacuity,  and  confusion. 
We  are  dazzled  by  the  multitude  of  words  which  sound  as  if  they  de- 
noted something  very  grand  or  splendid :  fragments  of  images  pass  in 
crowds  before  us;  but  when  the  procession  has  gone  by,  and  the 
tumult  of  it  is  over,  not  a  trace  of  it  remains  upon  the  memory.  The 
mind,  fatigued  and  perplexed,  is  mortified  by  the  consciousness  that  its 
labour  has  not  been  rewarded  by  the  acquisition  of  a  single  distinct 
conception;  the  ear,  too,  is  dissatisfied;  for  the  rhythm  of  the  verse  is 
often  harsh  and  unmusical;  and  both  the  ear  and  the  understanding 
are  disgusted  by  new  and  uncouth  words,  and  by  the  awkward  and 
intricate  construction  of  the  sentences.  The  predominating  character- 
istic of  Mr.  Shelley's  poetry,  however,  is  its  frequent  and  total  want  of 
meaning."  —  "Shelley  :  Prometheus  Unbound"  Quarterly  Review, 
October,  1821. 

"  In  Prometheus  Unbound  Shelley's  faith  in  the  ultimate  triumph  of 
good  found  its  most  complete  and  ideal  expression.  He  no  longer, 
as  in  The  Revolt  of  Islam  blends  truth  with  fiction;  scene,  stage,  and 
actors  are  in  unison..  The  harmony  shows  the  intellectual  accuracy 
and  sense  of  fitness  which  Shelley  was  developing.  The  lyrical  drama 
is  by  no  means  faultless,  and  unfortunately  for  its  popularity,  the  faults 
lie  thickest  at  the  outset.  But  if  the  reader  perseveres,  he  will  be 
swept  upward  in  a  whirlwind  of  song  from  height  to  height,  till  he 
reaches  a  dizzy  summit  of  lyric  inspiration  where  no  foot  but  Shelley's 
ever  trod  before.  The  grandeur  of  the  conception,  the  vivid  embodi- 
ment in  beautiful  form  of  inspiring  dreams,  the  majestic  soliloquy  of 
Prometheus  with  which  the  play  opens,  the  exquisite  speech  of  Asia, 
are  forgotten  in  the  music  of  the  lyric  outbursts,  which  send  a  sob  of 


PROMETHEUS   UNBOUND.  169 

hopeless  anguish  echoing  down  the  slopes  of  Caucasus,  or  convey  in 
sparkling  words  the  arrowy  summons  to  delight  of  a  fresh  spring  morn- 
ing, or  express  with  the  most  deft  and  unobtrusive  harmony  of  words 
the  thrilling  intensity  of  the  passion  of  love.  Yet  the  drama  is  finely 
conceived  and  firmly  compacted.  It  cannot  be  fairly  condemned  be- 
cause it  is  wanting  in  solidity,  since  its  very  essence  is  incorporeal, 
elemental,  ideal.  In  imaginative  realization  and  creative  energy,  Pro- 
metheus Unbound  is  a  masterly  achievement."  —  "  The  Character  of 
Shelley,"  Quarterly  Review,  April,  1887. 

"  A  genuine  liking  for  Prometheus  Unbound  may  be  reckoned  the 
touch-stone  of  a  man's  capacity  for  understanding  lyric  poetry."  — 
J.  A.  Symonds. 

"  There  is,  I  suppose,  no  poem  comparable,  in  the  fair  sense  of  that 
word,  to  Prometheus  Unbound.  The  immense  scale  and  boundless 
scope  of  the  conception;  the  marble  majesty  and  extra-mundane  pas- 
sions of  the  personages;  the  sublimity  of  ethical  aspiration;  the 
radiance  of  ideal  and  poetic  beauty  which  saturates  every  phase  of  the 
subject,  and  almost  (as  it  were)  wraps  it  from  sight  at  tunes,  and  trans- 
forms it  out  of  sense  into  spirit;  the  rolling  river  of  great  sound  and 
lyrical  rapture ;  form  a  combination  not  to  be  matched  elsewhere,  and 
scarcely  to  encounter  competition.  There  is  another  source  of  great- 
ness in  this  poem,  neither  to  be  foolishly  lauded,  nor  (still  less)  under- 
valued. It  is  this :  that  Prometheus  Unbound,  however  remote  the 
foundation  of  its  subject  matter,  and  unactual  its  executive  treatment, 
does  in  reality  express  the  most  modern  of  conceptions  —  the  utmost 
reach  of  speculation  of  a  mind  which  burst  up  all  crusts  of  custom  and 
prescription  like  a  volcano,  and  imaged  forth  a  future  wherein  man 
should  be  indeed  the  autocrat  and  renovated  renovator  of  his  planet. 
This  it  is,  I  apprehend,  which  places  Prometheus  clearly,  instead  of 
disputably,  at  the  summit  of  all  later  poetry :  the  fact  that  it  embodies, 
in  forms  of  truly  ecstatic  beauty,  the  dominant  passion  of  the  dominant 
intellects  of  the  age,  and  especially  of  one  of  the  extremest  and  highest 
among  them  all,  the  author  himself.  It  is  the  ideal  poem  of  perpetual 
and  triumphant  progression  —  the  Atlantis  of  Man  Emancipated."  — 
"Memoir  of  Shelley,"  William  M.  Rossetti. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY    OF     THE     PROMETHEUS 
UNBOUND. 


WILLIAM  M.  ROSSETTI.  Three  Articles  in  Shelley  Society  Publica- 
tions, Part  I. 

Shelley's  Prometheus  Unbound:   A  Study  of  its  Meaning  and 

Personages. 
Shelley's  Prometheus  Unbound  Considered  as  a  Poem. 

JAMES  THOMSON.  Notes  on  Shelley's  Prometheus  Unbound.  The 
Athenaum,  1881. 

JOHN  TODHUNTER.    A  Study  of  Shelley.    Chapters  V.,  VI. 

SIDNEY  LANIER.    The  English  Novel.     Lecture  V. 

VIDA  D.  SCUDDER.  The  Life  of  the  Spirit  in  the  Modern  English 
Poets.  Chapter  III.  Ideals  of  Redemption  Mediaeval  and  Modern  : 
the  Divine  Comedy  and  the  Prometheus  Unbound. 

Black-wood's.    September,  1820. 

The  Quarterly.    October,  1821. 

The  Literary  Gazette.    September,  1820. 

Dublin  University  Magazine,  1877. 

Gentleman's  Magazine.    February,  1848. 

Gentleman's  Magazine,  1874- 

Monthly  Review,  1821. 

Southern  Literary  Messenger,  1842. 

Month.    Vol.  31.    1884. 

Manchester  Quarterly.    Vol.  I.    1882. 

All  Lives  of  Shelley  and  all  critical  estimates  of  his  poetry  treat  at 

more  or  less  length  of  the  Prometheus  Unbound.    The  chief  authorities 

to  be  consulted  are  as  follows :  — 

Among    the    modern    biographers:    Dowden,    Rossetti,   Symonds, 

Sharp,  Salt,  Barnett  Smith,  Garnett,  Rabbe. 

Among  critical  essayists:  Bagehot,  Hutton,  Matthew  Arnold,  Swin- 
burne, Stopford  Brooke,  Shairp,  Aubrey  de  Vere,  Bourget. 

The  best  editions  of  Shelley's  works  are  those  of  H.  Buxton  Forman 

(English)  and  J.  H.  Woodberry  (American).  ^ 

171 


ADVERTISEMENTS. 


ENGLISH  LITERATURE. 


The  <Arden   Shakespeare. 


The  Greater  Plays  in  their  literary  aspect.  One  piay  in  each  volume,  with  In- 
troduction, Notes,  Essay  on  Metre,  and  Glossary.  Based  on  the  Globe  text. 
From  144  to  224  pages.  Cloth.  Price,  25  cents  a  volume. 

THIS  edition  presents  the  greater  plays  in  their  literary  aspect,  and 
not  merely  as  material  for  the  study  of  philology  or  grammar. 
Verbal  and  textual  criticism  has  been  included  only  so  far  as  may 
serve  to  help  the  student  in  his  appreciation  of  the  poetry. 

Questions  of  date  and  literary  history  have  been  fully  dealt  with  in 
the  Introductions,  but  the  larger  space  has  been  devoted  to  the  inter- 
pretative rather  than  to  the  matter-of-fact  order  of  scholarship.  ./Es- 
thetic judgments  are  never  final,  but  the  editors  have  attempted  to 
suggest  points  of  view  from  which  the  analysis  of  dramatic  motive 
and  dramatic  character  may  be  profitably  undertaken. 

In  the  Notes  likewise,  though  it  is  hoped  that  unfamiliar  expres- 
sions and  allusions  have  been  adequately  explained,  it  has  been 
thought  more  important  to  consider  the  dramatic  value  of  each  scene, 
and  the  part  that  it  plays  in  relation  to  the  whole. 

Each  volume  has  a  Glossary,  an  Essay  upon  Metre,  and  an  In- 
dex. Appendices  are  added  upon  points  of  interest  that  could  not  be 
treated  in  the  Introduction  or  the  Notes.  The  text  is  based  on 
that  of  the  Globe  edition.  The  following  plays  are  ready : — 

HAMLET.  —  Edited  by  Edmund  K.  Chambers,  B.A. 

MACBETH.  —  Edited  by  Edmund  K.  Chambers,  B.A.,  Oxford. 

JULIUS  C/ESAR. —  Edited  by  Arthur  D.  Innes,  M.A.,  Oxford. 

THE  MERCHANT  OF  VENICE. —  Edited  by  H.  L.  Withers,  B.A.,  Oxford. 

TWELFTH  NIGHT. —  Edited  by  Arthur  D.  Innes,  M.A.,  Oxford. 

As  You  LIKE  IT.  — Edited  by  J.  C.  Smith,  M.A.,  Edinburgh. 

A  MIDSUMMER  NIGHT'S  DREAM.  —  Edited  by  Edmund  K.  Chambers,  B.A. 

CYMBELINE.  —  Edited  by  A.  J.  Wyatt,  M.A.,  Cambridge. 

THE  TEMPEST.  —  Edited  by  F.  S.  Boas,  M.A.,  Oxford. 

KING  JOHN. —  Edited  by  G.  C.  Moore  Smith,  M.A.,  Cambridge. 

RICHARD  II.  — Edited  by  C.  H.  Herford,  L.H.D.,  Cambridge. 

RICHARD  III.  —  Edited  by  George  Macdonald,  M.A.,  Oxford. 

HENRY  V Edited  by  G.  C.  Moore  Smith,  M.A.,  Cambridge. 

HENRY  VIII.  — Edited  by  D.  Nichol  Smith,  M.A.,  Edinburgh. 
CORIOLANUS.  —  Edited  by  Edmund  K.  Chambers,  B.A.,  Oxford. 
MUCH  ADO  ABOUT  NOTHING.  —  Edited  by  J.  C.  Smith,  M.A.,  Oxford. 
KING  LF.AK.—  Edited  by  L>.  Nichol  Smith,  M.  A.,  Edinburgh. 


86  ENGLISH. 

Introduction   to  Shakespeare. 

By  HIRAM  CORSON,  LL.D.,  Professor  of  Rhetoric  and  English  Literature  in 
Cornell  University.    Cloth.    400  pages.     Introduction  price,  $1.00. 

THIS  work  indicates  some  lines  of  Shakespearean  thought  which 
serve  to  introduce  to  the  study  of  the  plays  as  plays.  The  intro- 
ductory chapter  is  followed  by  chapters  on :  The  Shakespeare-Bacon 
controversy,  —  The  Authenticity  of  the  First  Folio,  —  The  Chron- 
ology of  the  Plays,  —  Shakespeare's  Verse,  —  The  Latin  and  Anglo- 
Saxon  Elements  of  Shakespeare's  English.  The  larger  portion  of 
the  book  is  devoted  to  commentaries  and  critical  chapters  upon 
Romeo  and  Juliet,  King  John,  Much  Ado  about  Nothing,  Hamlet, 
Macbeth,  and  Anthony  and  Cleopatra.  These  aim  to  present  the 
points  of  view  demanded  for  a  proper  appreciation  of  Shakespeare's 
general  attitude  toward  things,  and  his  resultant  dramatic  art,  rather 
than  the  textual  study  of  the  plays. 

Introduction   to  Browning. 

By  HIRAM  CORSON,  LL.D.,  Professor  of  Rhetoric  and  English  Literature  in 
Cornell  University.    Cloth.    348  pages.    Introduction  price,  $1.00. 

THIS  volume  affords  aid  and  guidance  to  the  study  of  Robert 
Browning's  poetry,  which,  being  the  most  complexly  subjective 
of  all  English  poetry,  is,  for  that  reason  alone,  the  most  difficult. 
The  exposition  presented  in  the  Introduction,  of  the  constitution  and 
skillful  management  of  the  dramatic  monologue  and  the  Arguments 
given  to  the  several  poems  included  in  this  volume,  will,  it  is  hoped, 
reduce,  if  not  altogether  remove,  the  difficulties  of  this  kind.  In  the 
same  section  of  the  Introduction  certain  peculiarities  of  the  poet's 
diction  are  presented  and  illustrated. 

The  following  is  the  Table  of  Contents :  — 

I.  The  Spiritual  Ebb  and  Flow  exhibited  in  English  Poetry  from  Chaucer 
to  Tennyson  and  Browning.  II.  The  Idea  of  Personality  and  of  Art,  as  an 
intermediate  agency  of  Personality,  as  embodied  in  Browning's  Poetry.  (Read 
before  the  Browning  Society  of  London  in  1882.)  III.  Browning's  Obscurity. 
IV.  Browning's  Verse.  V.  Arguments  of  the  Poems.  VI.  Poems.  (Under 
this  head  are  thirty-three  representative  poems,  the  Arguments  of  which  are 
given  in  the  preceding  section.) 


ENGLISH. 


Judith  :  an  old  English  Epic  Fragment. 

Edited,  with  an  autotype  fac-simile,  by  ALBERT  S.  COOK,  Professor  of  the 
English  Language  and  Literature,  Yale  University.  Square  I2mo.  170  pages. 
Introduction  price,  j>i.  Student's  Edition.  Paper,  30  cents. 

THIS  volume  is  made  up  of  an  introduction,  discussing  the  date  of 
the  manuscript  and  the  sources  of  the  poem  ;  an  essay  on  the 
poetical  art  displayed  by  the  author  :  the  elements  of  grammar  and 
prosody  essential  to  an  understanding  of  the  text  itself,  with  its 
variants  ;  a  translation  on  alternate  pages  ;  a  glossary  ;  lists  of  com- 
pounds, verbal  correspondences,  repeated  and  peculiar  phrases,  etc. 


translated  into  Modern  Metres. 

By  JNO.  LESSLIE  HALL,  Professor  of  English  and  History,  College  of  William 
and  Mary.  Square  8vo.  128  pages.  Introduction  price,  75  cents.  Student's 
Edition.  Paper,  30  cents. 

THE  translation  is  based  upon  the  Heyne-Socin  text,  rarely  deviat- 
ing from  it.  The  translator  has  aimed  at  a  close,  but  not  slavish, 
rendering,  reproducing  sentences,  but  not  verses.  Parallelisms, 
frequent  alliterations,  archaic  forms,  and  occasional  ruggedness,  will 
please  the  scholar  ;  while  the  non-technical  reader  will  have  a  toler- 
ably regular  cadence  to  take  him  quite  smoothly  through  the  poem. 


The  Tragedies  of  Sophocles. 


A  New   Translation,  -with  an  Appendix  of  Rhymed  Choruses.      By  E.  H. 
PLUMPTRE,  Dean  of  Wells.    Cloth.     598  pages.     Introduction  price,  $1.00. 


Pall  Mall  Gazette :  Dean  Plump- 
tre  has  not  only  surpassed  previous 
translators,  but  has  produced  a  work  of 


singular  merit,  not  less  remarkable  for  its 
felicity  than  its  fidelity,  a  really  readable 
and  enjoyable  version  of  the  old  plays. 


The  Tragedies  of  sEschylos. 

A  New  Translation,  with  a  Biographical  Essay  and  an  Appendix  of  Rhymed 
Choruses.  By  E.  H.  PLUMPTRE,  Dean  of  Wells.  Cloth.  446  pages.  Intro- 
duction  price,  $1.00.  . 

THESE  two  famous  translations  of  ancient  Greek  Tragedies  are 
republished    in    this  new  and  cheaper  form    at  the  request  of 
many  teachers  and  lecturers  on  Ancient  Drama  and  Literature. 


ENGLISH.  91 

The  Literary  Study  of  the  Bible. 

An  account  of  the  leading  forms  of  Literature  represented  in  the  Sacred  Writ- 
ings. Intended  for  English  Readers.  By  RICHARD  G.  MOULTON,  Professor 
of  Literature  in  English  in  the  University  of  Chicago ;  author  of  "  Shakespeare 
as  a  Dramatic  Artist."  "  The  Ancient  Classical  Drama,"  etc.  Revised  and 
largely  rewritten.  Cloth.  584  pages.  Retail  price,  $2.00. 

THIS  work  deals  with  the  Bible  as  literature,  without  reference  to 
theological  or  distinctively  religious  matters  on  the  one  hand, 
or  on  the  other  hand  to  the  historical  analysis  which  has  come  to  be 
known  as  "  the  higher  criticism."  With  a  view  to  the  general 
reader  it  endeavors  to  bring  out  the  literary  interest  of  Scripture,  so 
often  obscured  by  reading  in  verse  or  short  fragments.  For  the 
professed  student  of  literature  it  has  the  further  purpose  of  discuss- 
ing methodically  such  literary  forms  as  epic,  lyric,  dramatic,  etc.,  so 
far  as  they  appear  in  one  of  the  world's  great  literatures.  It  assumes 
that  the  English  Bible  is  a  supreme  classic,  the  thorough  study  of 
which  must  form  a  part  of  all  liberal  education. 

The  cordial  reception  given  to  this  book  by  students  of  literature 
and  of  the  Scriptures  has  led  the  author  to  prepare  a  book  for 
general  readers,  which  is  described  below. 

CONTENTS:  The  Book  of  Job,  and  the  Various  Kinds  of  Literary  Interest  illus- 
trated by  it.  I.  First  Principles  of  Biblical  Literature.  II.  Lyric  Poetry  of  the 
Bible.  III.  Biblical  History  and  Epic.  IV.  Biblical  Literature  of  Rhetoric. 
V.  The  Philosophy  of  the  Bible,  or  Wisdom  Literature.  VI.  Biblical  Literature 
of  Prophecy.  Appendixes. 

<A  Short  Introduction  to  the  Literature  of 

the  Bible.  By  RICHARD  G.  MOULTON,  author  of  "  The  Literary  Study  of 
the  Bible,"  "  Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist,"  etc.,  editor  of  "  The  Modern 
Reader's  Bible."  Cloth.  382  pages.  Retail  price,  $1.00. 

THIS  is  not  an  abridgement  of  the  larger  book  by  the  same 
author,  but  is  an  independent  work,  dealing  less  with  technical- 
ities, and  more  with  the  matter  of  Holy  Scripture,  considered  from  its 
literary  side.  The  aim  has  been  to  make  a  serviceable  book  for  the 
general  reader,  whether  more  or  less  cultured ;  also,  with  the  aid  of 
an  appendix,  to  afford  a  manual  for  pastors  and  teachers. 

CONTENTS:  Introduction.  —  The  literary  study  of  the  Bible  as  distinct  from 
theology  and  criticism.  Part  I.  Biblical  History  and  Story:  i.  History  and 
Story;  2.  The  History  of  the  People  of  Israel  as  Presented  by  Themselves;  3. 
The  History  of  the  New  Testament  Church  as  Presented  by  Itself.  Part  II. 
Biblical  Poetry  and  Prose :  4.  Poetry  and  Prose  in  the  Bible ;  5.  Old  Testament 
Wisdom ;  6.  New  Testament  Wisdom ;  7.  Lyric  Poetry  of  the  Bible ;  8.  Prophecy 
as  a  Form  of  Literature;  9.  Old  Testament  Prophecy;  10.  New  Testament 
Prophecy.  Appendixes. 


ENGLISH. 


Dante :  Divina  Commedia  and  Canzoniere. 

Translated,  with  notes,  studies  and  estimates,  by  E.  H.  PLUMPTRE,  Dean  of 
Wells.  In  five  volumes.  Vol.  i — Hell.  Vol.  ii  —  Purgatory.  Vol.  iii  —  Para- 
dise. Vol.  iv — Minor  Poems.  Vol.  v — Studies.  Cloth.  Small  I2mo.  Each 
volume  with  frontispiece.  Library  Edition:  Five  volumes  in  a  box.  Uncut 
edges.  Extra  gilt,  #4.00.  Student's  Edition:  50  cents  per  volume.  In  the 
student's  edition  the  volumes  will  be  sold  separately. 

THE  charm  and  accuracy  of  Plump tre's  translation  of  Dante  are 
well  known.     The  translation  of  the  Commedia  is  for  the  most 
part  based  on  Scartazzini's  text  (1874-82),  with  due  attention  to  the 
various   readings  that  materially  affect  the  sense..     In  the   Minor 
Poems  the  order  and  text  of  Fraticelli's  edition  (1873)  are  followed. 

With  regard  to  the  Terza  Rima  of  the  Commedia  and  the  metrical 
forms  of  the  Canzoniere,  the  translator  was  deeply  impressed  with  the 
conviction  that,  in  default  of  absolute  identity  of  form,  it  is  "  the  duty 
and  the  wisdom  of  a  translator  to  aim  at  the  nearest  possible  analogue  " 
attainable,  and  to  reproduce,  as  far  as  the  nature  of  the  English  lan- 
guage admits,  the  structure  and  recurrence  of  rhymes  which  give 
sonnet  and  canzone  their  distinctive  charm. 

Milton 's   Paradise   Lost. 

Books  I  and  If,  -with  portions  of  Books  III,  IV,  VI,  VII  and  X.  Edited,  with 
Introduction,  suggestions  for  study  and  glossary,  by  ALBERT  PERRY  WALKER, 
Master  in  the  Bpston  English  High  School.  Cloth.  Illustrated.  282  pages. 
Introduction  price,  45  cents. 

IN  this  book  the  editor  has  made  a  radical  departure  from  the  usual 
method  of  annotating  texts  for  school  use,  by  discarding  formal 
notes  on  individual  words  or  expressions.  The  information  usually 
distributed  through  a  heterogeneous  mass  of  notes  is  here  embodied 
in  an  introduction  treating  in  a  systematic  manner  the  popular,  scien- 
tific, religious,  and  mythological  conceptions  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  as  they  appear  in  Milton's  poems,  and  other  matters  of 
general  information  with  which  readers  of  literature  are  assumed  to 
be  conversant. 

Milton  s  Select  Poems. 

Edited  by  ALBERT  PERRY  WALKER.  Contains  the  book  described  above  and 
Milton's  Minor  Poems,  described  on  page  82,  bound  in  one  volume.  Cloth. 
411  pages.  Introduction  price,  50  cents. 


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